Prime Minister Narendra Modi's personal website's Twitter account was hacked, and tweets posted asking for people to donate cryptocurrency. This was confirmed by Twitter, and all the tweets posted as a result of the hack have been removed. However, screenshots are now being circulated on Twitter with people even claiming that these tweets were from PM Modi's account.
Twitter said it was aware of the activity and has taken steps to secure the compromised account. “We are actively investigating the situation. At this time, we are not aware of additional accounts being impacted,” a Twitter spokeswoman said.
However, the PM's account, which has 61.8 million followers, was not affected. The tweets were posted from the Twitter account used by PM Modi's official website that has only 2.5 million followers.
“I appeal to you all to donate generously to PM National Relief Fund for Covid-19, Now India begin with crypto currency, Kindly Donate eth (Ethereum) 0xae073DB1e5752faFF169B1ede7E8E94bF7f80Be6 (sic),” read one tweet from the hackers.
According to the tweets shared, the account was hacked by a group called John Wick, which, it was alleged, had also hacked into Paytm Mall. However the tweet denied responsibility for the Paytm Mall hack.
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Earlier twitter accounts of prominent personalities were hacked. Hackers had accessed Twitter’s internal systems to hijack some of the website’s top profiles including US presidential candidate Joe Biden, former US President Barack Obama and billionaire business tycoon Elon Musk, and used them to solicit digital currency. The corporate accounts for Uber and Apple were also compromised in the major breach.
The incident raised concerns around Twitter tools and levels of employee access.