Two Associated Press Twitter accounts were hacked Tuesday, sending out a tweet claiming that President Barack Obama had been injured in explosions at the White House:
Within minutes, AP Corporate Communications reported that the tweet was false.
That is a bogus @ap tweet.
— AP CorpComm (@AP_CorpComm) April 23, 2013
The AP later reported that hackers "compromised" the main Twitter account, and sent out the tweet after "repeated attempts to steal the passwords of AP journalists."
A few moments after the tweet, the AP's White House correspondent Julie Pace began the first question at the White House press briefing by confirming that the account was hacked.
"I appreciate you saying that," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney replied. "The President is fine, I just spoke with him.
The AP Twitter account has been suspended.
UPDATE:
The so-called "Syrian Electronic Army," a group of pro-regime hackers, is claiming credit for hacking AP's official Twitter feeds.
Ops! @ap get owned by Syrian Electronic Army! #SEA#Syria#ByeByeObamatwitter.com/Official_SEA6/…
— SyrianElectronicArmy (@Official_SEA6) April 23, 2013
This appears to be the organization's third successful hack of an American media outlet in just over one week. Over the weekend, the group claimed credit for similar attacks on Twitter feeds run by CBS News, and last week, the group successfully attacked NPR's content management system and Twitter feed.