Dharamsala, Aug 13 (IANS): Hackers Tuesday attacked the Chinese-language official website of the Tibetan government-in-exile, making it virus prone, an official said here Tuesday.

"Our official website has been attacked by China-based spy network. Visitors can be harmed by an unidentified virus," Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) press officer Lobsang Choedak told IANS.

He said only the Chinese language version was hacked and the English and Tibetan language websites were working normally.

Choedak said earlier also their e-mail accounts were hacked. "But we are taking precautions," he added.

Tibet.net is the official site that covers issues related to the CTA.

However, the official website of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, www.dalailama.com, is functioning normally.

Computers in the office of the Nobel laureate have been hacked numerous times, admit officials in his private office.

Canadian researchers in a report in 2009 said a cyber spy network, based mainly in China, hacked the computers of the Dalai Lama's exile centres in India, Brussels, London and New York.

The Canadian researchers, associated with Ottawa-based think-tank SecDev Group and University of Toronto's Munk Center for International Studies, had said the hacking system was being controlled from computers based almost exclusively in China, but that they could not say conclusively that the Chinese government was involved.

They said they believed that in addition to spying on the Dalai Lama, the system - which they called GhostNet - was focused on the governments of South Asian and Southeast Asian countries.

The Dalai Lama, 78, has lived in India since 1959 when he fled his homeland after a failed uprising against Communist rule. His government-in-exile is based here but is not recognised by any country, including India.

Some 140,000 Tibetans live in exile around the world, over 100,000 of them in India.