I&B ministry’s Twitter handle briefly hacked with Elon Musk’s name, later restored

On Wednesday, the official Twitter handle of the ministry of information and broadcasting seemed to be briefly hacked.

Several journalists tweeted that the name of the handle was briefly changed to “Elon Musk” and the timeline had a series of tweets urging people to click on a link. The hackers also changed the font of the handle.

Shortly afterwards, the ministry put out a tweet indicating that the account had been restored. The spam tweets were deleted from the timeline as well.

According to a report by India Today, the Twitter accounts of the Indian Council of World Affairs, Indian Medical Association and Mann Deshi Mahila Bank were also hacked on January 3. The handles were renamed “Elon Musk” in that case too. The report also states that during the January 3 hackings the font of the handle was the same as this time. Those behind the hackings have not yet been identified.

Last month, prime minister Narendra Modi’s Twitter account was also briefly hacked with Bitcoin posts.