{"id":22458,"date":"2025-04-16T23:02:09","date_gmt":"2025-04-16T23:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/?p=22458"},"modified":"2025-04-16T23:02:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-16T23:02:09","slug":"crypto-con-hits-the-high-office-ministers-x-account-hacked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/?p=22458","title":{"rendered":"Crypto Con Hits The High Office: Minister\u2019s X Account Hacked"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

UK Government Minister Lucy Powell\u2019s X account was hacked on Tuesday morning in a cryptocurrency scam<\/a> for a phony \u201cHouse of Commons\u201d digital currency, multiple news sources disclosed Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Hackers Create Fake Government Cryptocurrency<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The cyberattackers put up a number of posts on Powell\u2019s authenticated account stating \u201c$HCC\u201d<\/a> was \u201ca people-powered digital currency putting people\u2019s power to the blockchain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Powell, the leader of the House of Commons and Manchester Central\u2019s representative, has close to 70,000 followers on the platform.<\/p>\n

Certain messages added the formal House of Commons logo to give the scam the air of legitimacy. Powell\u2019s office said they \u201cpursued steps promptly to lock in the account and delete deceptive posts\u201d after they became aware of the breach.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Recent letters In Series Of Top-Profile Account Takeovers<\/strong><\/h2>\n

This attack<\/a> follows a pattern of similar hacks targeting public figures with large follower counts. BBC journalist Nick Robinson fell victim to a similar scheme earlier this year when hackers used his account to promote a fake cryptocurrency called \u201c$Today.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robinson reported clicking on what he thought was a legitimate email from the social media platform, which gave hackers access to his account.<\/p>\n

\n

Leader of the House of Commons Lucy Powell has had her X account hacked and is promoting a House of Commons cryptocurrency pic.twitter.com\/05KKYfS8ho<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Daniel Green (@DanGreenJourno) April 15, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u2018Pump And Dump\u2019 Scheme Yields Limited Returns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Luke Nolan, a senior research associate at digital asset manager CoinShares, recognized the hack<\/a> as a traditional \u201cpump and dump\u201d scheme.<\/p>\n

In this widespread scam, perpetrators create worthless cryptocurrencies, artificially pump up their price, persuade others to invest, and then sell their shares for profit before the price crashes.<\/p>\n

Even though the scam targeted a high-profile government official\u2019s account, the scam was relatively unsuccessful. The imposter coin<\/a> attracted only 34 transactions, with the scammers making around \u00a3225 in profits.<\/p>\n


\nGrowing Trend In Account Hacking<\/strong><\/p>\n

Action Fraud also reports that there has been a high incidence of social media and email account hacking in 2024 to date, at 35,343. Security experts say they suspect most attacks start with emails that have a link to fake websites that pilfer passwords or gain unauthorized system access.<\/p>\n

\n

Minister\u2019s X account hacked to promote crypto scam https:\/\/t.co\/uXl5KE8n3l<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) April 15, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Passwords can also be accessed via data breaches where users\u2019 information is hacked and put on sale online. It takes scammers just a few hours to create and roll out counterfeit cryptocurrencies, and then they move swiftly once they have access to an account.<\/p>\n

The UK Parliament official said they \u201ctake cyber security extremely seriously\u201d and give members advice on how to manage online safety, but refused to disclose specific information on their cybersecurity practices.<\/p>\n

Action Fraud advises people to safeguard their accounts by registering two-step verification and adopting hard, different passwords of three randomly chosen words.<\/p>\n

Powell has been a leader of the House of Commons since Labour came to power in the summer. Her work entails scheduling the government\u2019s legislative programme and safeguarding the rights of backbench MPs.<\/p>\n

Featured image from Business Insider, chart from TradingView<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UK Government Minister Lucy Powell\u2019s X account was hacked on Tuesday morning in a cryptocurrency scam for a phony \u201cHouse of Commons\u201d digital currency, multiple news sources disclosed Wednesday. Hackers Create Fake Government Cryptocurrency The cyberattackers put up a number of posts on Powell\u2019s authenticated account stating \u201c$HCC\u201d was \u201ca people-powered digital currency putting people\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3,4,5],"class_list":["post-22458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-crypto","tag-doge","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22458\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dogewisperer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}