FBI investigates NBC News Twitter account hack

THE G-MEN of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are investigating the hacking of US television broadcaster NBC's Twitter account.

On Saturday NBC News' Twitter account was hacked by a group calling itself The Script Kiddies. The group then proceeded to post messages claiming airliners had crashed into Ground Zero, the site of the 9/11 terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center in New York City.

NBC claims that only three executives have the password to the Twitter account, nevertheless The Script Kiddies - allegedly the same group that was behind the humbling of Fox News - managed to post four messages within a matter of minutes. NBC and Twitter managed to remove the messages within 10 minutes and apologised on air for any distress that the messages might have generated.

FBI officials confirmed to MSNBC that agents from the bureau's computer crimes unit are investigating. This is the same FBI unit that is looking into hacking by Anonymous and Lulzsec. A US government official specialising in security told MSNC, "The truth is it's relatively easy to get into these accounts."

NBC News' Twitter account is followed by some 130,000 Twitter users and the attack was seemingly timed to cause panic on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, however it failed.

Following the messages, NBC News tweeted, "Our account is secure and under control. Apologize for the scare. We value your trust." Later it went on to say, "Thank you for helping spread the word and not sharing bad information." µ