Hackers apparently broke into the FoxNews.com’s Twitter feed for political news early Monday and used it to announce—falsely—that President Barack Obama had been assassinated.
Obama was “shot twice at a Ross’ restaurant in Iowa while campaigning. RIP Obama, best regards to the Obama family,” read one of several Twitter messages posted on @FoxNewsPolitics early Monday.
“We wish @joebiden the best of luck as our new President of the United States. In such a time of madness, there’s light at the end of tunnel,” the last in the series of tweets said later.
An article on FoxNews.com confirmed the hack.
“Hackers sent out several malicious and false tweets claiming that President Obama had been assassinated,” it said. “Those reports are incorrect, of course, and the president is spending the July 4 holiday with his family.
“The hacking is being investigated, and One of the false message said, “it’s a sad 4th of July … The shooter will be found.” That message encouraged Twitter users to post the message on their own Twitter accounts, which would spread the fake news. Several users did just that.
The tweets generated headlines around the world, criticisms and mockery on Twitter, with firebrand liberal TV host Keith Olbermann frantically tweeting to many individual Twitter users that Obama is fine. He asked Twitter users not to re-post the messages.
The first of the false tweets were posted around 2 a.m. ET. They were still up four hours later, with no explanation of their origin. The Twitter messages asserting that Obama had been attacked came after a message that said, “Just regained full access to our Twitter and email. Happy 4th.”
The @FoxNewsPolitics Twitter account has 34,566 followers.
Twitter did not immediately responded to CNN requests for comment.
(Source: CNN)
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5 Responses
Good thing nobody believes Fox News.
You mean no Liberals belive Fox News…
nfgo3,
You really should see someone about your issue. I mean calling yourself a ‘nobody’ really says a lot about your lack of self esteem. Now if you would say nobody believes MSnbcObamaTV, that would be believable.
No. 3: My comment no. 1 reflected my view that a report about the assassination of the US president would be picked up by many news services if it came from a credible source, but in fact, I saw little or no reporting about the “reported assassination.”
You do get an “A” for consistency, though, by suggesting that my comment reflects some sort of mental illness for which I need treatment. Have you ever posted a comment about anything that did not contain some unfounded insult of someone?
And by the way, I thought the cons objected to all the self-esteem-boosting stuff that goes on in public schools. So maybe your consistency is not so consistent. My self-esteem is, I think, appropriately modest. For one thing, I try to avoid name-calling and dispensing mental-health advice as I am not a mental-health professional. Are you?
nfgo: The entire media, including the foreign ones like the BBC, in fact picked up this FOX tweet. Sorry to have disappointed you.