BEIJING, Feb. 19 (Xinhuanet) -- With its contents appearing on the BitTorrent file-sharing network, one of Harvard University's websites appeared to have been hacked on the U.S. Presidents Day.

A compressed 125 MB file described as the database for the Web site of Harvard's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences is available via the BitTorrent P-to-P (peer to peer) network. The file is listed on The Pirate Bay, a website that indexes torrents, or small information files that coordinate the download of content from other users on BitTorrent.

A note attached to the torrent claimed the file contained a backup of the site-- including some contacts files and other files associated with Joomla, an open-source content management system -- along with other various bits. It appears to be legitimate.

The note's writer claimed the stunt is intended to demonstrate the insecurity of Harvard's server. The writer also exposed what purport to be usernames and passwords belonging to two of the site's system administrators.

"Stupid people, you don't use a secure password," read a note preceding the sensitive information.

As of Monday afternoon, the compromised file was being distributed by 11 users -- known in file-sharing terminology as "seeders" -- and was being downloaded by nine "leechers," or those downloading the files.

The website for the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences was offline on Monday.