Fox News Twitter Hacker Fakes Obama’s Death

Early Monday morning, Fox News was hit by a surprise attack through its cyber network. According to ABC News, hackers broke into Fox’s twitter account, used for political news statements, and posted claims that “Obama had been assassinated.”

Fox had to contact the Secret Service, who are now investigating the case to discover the hacker and study the tweets for any thing that would threaten the President’s safety. There has been no comment from them about the status of the search nor would they comment about the tweets themselves.

One of the tweets posted stated, “President @ BarackObama assassinated, 2 gunshot wounds have proved too much. It’s a sad 4^th for #america. #obamadead RIP.” These tweets were posted for the full viewing of Fox’s 33,000 followers close to 2am. The distressed followers spread the rumors and statements all over the Internet in their hopes of finding more news.

There were 6 tweets total that were posted, and all were on unsettling descriptions of Obama’s fake death, including one that stated Obama was “shot twice at Ross’ restaurant in Iowa” during his campaign.” Other tweets were the hackers welcoming Joe Bidden as the new President and of the search for the shooter. The Huffington Post stated that the hackers even changed the Fox News Icon used for twitter and replaced it with, “H4CK3D BY TH3 5CR1PT K1DD3S.”

The tweets were taken down later in the day on Monday. Fox apologized for any grief the hackers may have caused from their posts and that they will be conducting a thorough investigation of how the incident occurred and how to prevent future occurrences.

Obama was safe from these statements and was nowhere near the Ross restaurant. Instead he was attending a BBQ at the White House that was hosted for the government employees, families that were at the South Lawn on Sunday, and the military members with their families.

Photos courtesy of Mike Licht, Andy Melton, and BeckyF via Flickr.