“My Twitter account was hacked by someone,” claims Maszlee Malik

Education Minister, Maszlee Malik issued a public apology today claiming that his Twitter account was hacked after his Twitter followers noticed a strange series of tweets coming from the account.

Twitter user azrism managed to screen capture two tweets from the education minister’s Twitter account and asked if the minister’s social media account administrator had “forgotten” to switch to their personal account.

One of the tweets read in Malay: “Come… spread love. Reject distant happiness” while another bewildering message read: “Wowww Vitamin D people! This is the problem of befriending those who enter the office 7am and switch on the aircon. Perrrhh best nye”.

The next message that came was presumably posted by the minister personally

“I am sorry. My Twitter was hacked by someone but had been successfully overcome immediately,” it read.

Maszlee is not the first political figure to raise eyebrows with his tweets and then announce that his social media account was compromised.

Last month, former defence minister and Sembrong MP Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein said his Twitter account was also hacked after he “liked” an explicit video of a scantily dressed white woman in front of a kitchen sink under a post titled “******* the stepmother with force”.

But is it really hacking?

According to Google, “hacking” is defined as “the gaining of unauthorized access to data in a system or computer”. It’s not easy to hack into someone’s social media account and typically, after gaining access to an account, a hacker would use the account to spread their message or agenda.

I can understand why a high-profile account like the minister of education is a prized target for hackers. To date, the account has over 88,000 followers. One can inflict some serious political damage with such an account.

If I were a hacker that was successful in hacking Maszlee’s account, I would tweet more substantial messages like “no school tomorrow!” or “those who complain about my education policies should get educated themselves”, just to spice things up.

Instead, the strange tweets from the minister’s Twitter account are harmless ramblings and don’t look like the work of a hacker, rather it appears that someone managing the account made a mistake.

I could be wrong but I believe this is very likely the case and the minister would have earned brownie point by admitting that it was an honest mistake rather than cry wolf and blame hacker.

[via Malay Mail]