[tweet https://twitter.com/Official_SEA16/statuses/394878079044055041
The pro-regime hacker group, the Syrian Electronic Army, snagged a big fish today: They managed to hack a link on the Obama campaign Twitter feed and send users to a propaganda video on YouTube (since removed). The group also accessed the emails of many members who work for Obama’s campaign group, Organizing For America.
[tweet https://twitter.com/BarackObama/statuses/394862826637905920]
“Only the links within our tweets had been hacked,” an OFA official acknowledged. “At no point did they have access to the twitter handle,” the official said. Like many companies, the Obama campaign has a separate app for their unique shortened URLs, instead of relying on Twitter’s (it’s easier to track user engagement). Quartz reports that the campaign members have since beefed up their security with Google’s two-step authentication.
The formerly hacked link above about immigration has since been corrected.
This isn’t the first time the SEA has successfully gone after the president. Last spring, the SEA hacked the AP Twitter account to spread a rumor that the White House had been bombed, sending the stock market into a momentary crash.
Today’s hack was particularly sneaky because it didn’t look like anything was suspicious. But, the more important question is, why weren’t they using basic security protocol in the first place?