Fox News' Twitter account hack claims Obama assassinated
04 Jul 2011
The Twitter account for Fox News was apparently hacked, today, with six tweets that falsely reported US president Barack Obama being shot twice in an Iowa restaurant while campaigning.
The tweets were posted between 2 am and 3 am Eastern Time by the "foxnewspolitics" account and carried a badge with a checkmark meaning they had been verified by Twitter for authenticity.
National media outlets in the US, including Fox News reported no such incident, however Fox News ran a story on its website acknowledging the hack, saying it "regrets any distress the false tweets may have created."
The false tweets come on Independence Day, a major holiday in the US.
The first tweet about the assassination, addressed directly to Obama's real account read "@BarackObama has just passed. The President is dead. A sad 4th of July, indeed. President Barack Obama is dead."
Subsequent tweets said that Obama had been shot twice in the lower pelvic area and the neck and that he later died from his wounds, with the shooter unknown.
