A UK government Twitter account in Wales has been compromised and was used to briefly to post a pornography video clip.

The security incident took place on Monday afternoon, when the official Twitter account of the UK Government in Wales posted the indecent video.

An official told the BBC that the matter was quickly detected and the explicit imagery taken down within “moments”.

Porn tweet

The official also apparently confirmed it was a “cyber-attack” rather than an accidental post by the social media team, as some had speculated.

“We are aware that our account was subject to a cyber-attack earlier,” the government account tweeted later.

“We apologise for any offence caused by the material shared. We are confident the issue has now been resolved,” it added.

The offensive tweet was reportedly in the form of a retweet, which asked viewers to rate an attached video clip from one to 10 in return for the promise of further material via a direct message.

Twitter hacks

It should be noted that hacking of Twitter accounts has been ongoing for years and has included targets such as well known public figures, restaurant chains, and even at one stage the Twitter account of the US military.

In 2017 for example, the Twitter account of controversial security expert John McAfee was hacked and began to promote cryptocurrencies not endorsed by McAfee.

And then in September this year, the Twitter account of Jack Dorsey, co-founder and chief executive of Twitter, was briefly taken over by hackers.

The attackers apparently used a SIM-swapping attack to access the account, and Dorsey’s account briefly tweeted racist and offensive remarks for about 15 minutes.

A suspect for that hack has reportedly been arrested in the US in connection with that attack.

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Tom Jowitt

Tom Jowitt is a leading British tech freelancer and long standing contributor to Silicon UK. He is also a bit of a Lord of the Rings nut...

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