(CNN) -- For Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, it was a global virtual black eye. Instead of seeing his photo on the new European Union site, launched this week as Spain took over the presidency, visitors were greeted by Rowan Atkinson's comic character of Mr. Bean. And if you clicked over to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Web site, you'd see that hackers took him on, too. The text on his site was replaced with a note remarking on the death of "my favorite singer Michael Jackson" and "my favorite voice Neda," the woman killed last year during protests over Iranian elections. It ended with a request that God smite Ahmadinejad and "my favorite dictator [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei in 2010."
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Hackers replaced photo of Spain PM with Mr. Bean on new European Union site
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's hacked with message asking God to kill Iranian president
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Security experts say clicking to laugh at hack could leave users vulnerable
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Expert: Hacking government sites is "21st century form of a street protest"
"With both of those sites, given the political climate in @placeholder or the EU president site, either of these could have equally been used to distribute malware for journalists or people going to the sites for very valid reasons," McPherson said.
Ironically, cybersecurity is one of the issues @placeholder and Spain plan to tackle as part of a digital agenda while it holds the EU presidency.