The British Army has confirmed the breaching of its Twitter and YouTube accounts.
On Sunday, July 3rd, the British Army confirmed that its YouTube and Twitter accounts were hacked to promote crypto scams. An official investigation has already begun to determine the perpetrators of this cybercrime but there’s no confirmation regarding who is behind these attacks.
The Hacking of Twitter Account
Reportedly, the official name of the Twitter account was replaced with BAPESCAN, which originally was British Army. For your information, BAPESCAN is the name of an NFT group.
Moreover, the profile picture was also replaced with the image of a cartoon monkey with a painted face. This is also the signature icon of the NFT group. The hackers also changed British Army’s Twitter handle’s description with the following content:
“Follow us for news and information on deployments, training exercises, ceremonial duties & regimental events. Recruiting @armyjobs” to “#1 metavesto clan on the ETH chain with multi-billion dollar experience. Powered by @chaintchlabs”.
The hackers tried to link the Army’s Twitter account with The Possessed NFT collection from PSSSSD Labs. After the Army restored possession of the account and changed the name and description, there were still retweets of NFT-related posts.
These retweets were present on the Twitter account until late Sunday night, after which the retweets were deleted. The Army posted an apology on Twitter that read:
“Apologies for the temporary interruption to our feed. We will conduct a full investigation and learn from this incident. Thanks for following us and normal service will now resume.”
The Hacking of YouTube Account
Around the same time when the British Army’s Twitter account was hacked, the institution’s YouTube channel was also hacked. The account name was replaced with the name and logo of an international investment firm Ark Invest. But it isn’t confirmed whether this company is responsible for breaching the YouTube account.
As seen by Hackread.com, hackers used the YouTube account to promote Elon Musk’s interviews where he’s promoting crypto. They also posted clips of previous live streams from ex-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, which took place in June 2021 at a conference organized by Ark Invest.
It is worth noting that thousands viewed these live streams. Some of the videos directed users to Ethereum and Bitcoin scams. Nevertheless, the British Army’s YouTube channel is now restored, but the account was terminated for breaching the Community Guidelines of YouTube.
British Army’s Statement
Per the statement from a spokesperson of the British Army, they are aware of the breach, and an investigation is underway.
“We take information security extremely seriously and are resolving the issue. Until the investigation is complete, it would be inappropriate to comment further,” the spokesperson said.
