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(Image source: The White House / Pete Souza)
BY MATT PICHT
A group of hackers claimed Monday it hijacked email and social media accounts affiliated
with President Obama's re-election campaign, subtly altering Twitter and Facebook posts.
Several messages posted to the Obama Facebook and Twitter accounts Monday morning contained
links redirecting visitors to a graphic video showing violent footage from the Syrian civil
war. A campaign donation website was also taken down.
Credit for the hack was quickly claimed by the Syrian Electronic Army, a group of hackers
loosely aligned with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. The SEA is known for targeting major
media outlets and pushing pro-Assad propaganda. (Via ZDNet)
Now the hackers claim they've taken over the social media accounts of the president himself,
posting photos of stolen email accounts belonging to Obama's campaign staffers on Twitter along
with messages taunting the president and his supporters.
But as The Atlantic points out, the SEA might be slightly exaggerating the impact of these
hacks.
Although the hijacked social media accounts bear the president's name, they're actually
owned by Organizing For Action, a non-profit offshoot of Obama's 2012 election campaign.
"There is no connection between the group and the White House beyond shared allegiances
and relationships."
The SEA appears to have gained access to Organizing For Action's social media through hacked email
accounts belonging to several group staffers.
One of the hacked staffers told Quartz the organization has changed passwords and added
an extra layer of security to the login process.
From there, the SEA hijacked the URL shortener used by Organizing For Action and changed
the links embedded in the group's social media posts. An OFA official told The Huffington
Post "at no point did they have access to the twitter handle. ... Only the links within
our tweets had been hacked."
It's unlikely any sensitive data was stolen by the SEA, and these hacks aren't likely
to have any long-term effect. But according to The Washington Post, this latest attack
is perfectly in line with the SEA's M. O.
"The Syrian Electronic Army actually makes a lot more sense if you think of them as pranksters
who also happen to love Assad than as state-aligned hackers in pursuit of concrete goals. ... The
hacks get a lot of attention and that's pretty much it."
All misleading links on the OFA social media accounts have now been fixed and the hacked
website has been repaired.