'60 Minutes' and '48 Hours' Twitter Accounts Hacked, Sent Anti-Obama Messages

April 21st, 2013 11:52 AM

The Twitter accounts of CBS's 60 Minutes and 48 Hours have been hacked and suspended.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, before the suspension, anti-Obama messages were sent:

"Exclusive: Terror is striking the #USA and #Obama is Shamelessly in Bed with Al-Qaeda," the tweet -- published around 12:30 p.m. PT to 60 Minutes' twitter feed and then re-tweeted on 48 Hours' feed -- reads.

Several minutes later, 48 Hours issued a tweet reading, "Our #48hours account has been compromised. We are working with Twitter to resolve the issue."

CBS News also tweeted from its account, "We have experienced problems on Twitter accounts of #60Minutes & @48Hours; We apologize for the inconvenience; Twitter is resolving issues."

The tweet included a link to a December 2012 LaRouchePAC.com post titled "Obama is Shamelessly in Bed with Al-Qaeda."

The Associated Press reported early Sunday that the 60 Minutes account also tweeted that "the US government was "hiding the real culprit of the Boston bombing."

Boston.com elaborated:

A group calling itself the "Syrian Cyber Army" took the credit this time - in a Tweet that originated in Indonesian.

An outfit called the "Syrian Electrionic Army" launched a similar attack on NPR last week.

The first hacked Tweet was posted at about 10:31 p.m. Eastern and a stream of about 20 posts ridiculing President Obama, the United States and supporting the Syrian government of Syrian President Bashar Assad, flowed continually for about 20 minutes before the account was finally suspended.

One Tweet showed a Photoshopped version of the president morphed into Alfred E. Neuman with the quote: "We don't negotiate with terrorists because we are the terrorists." 

At press time, both Twitter accounts remain suspended.