Yesterday Sky News appeared to tweet a strange message to their 900,000 followers. It simply read: "Colin was here". One would assume an unruly (and possibly intoxicated) employee had accessed the account and would soon be collecting his P45.
That was not the case however as it soon emerged that Sky News' Twitter account was hijacked by a shady group called the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA). The tweet was up for half an hour before it was deleted and Sky released a press release to clarify the issue.
The same group recently hacked the White House's account and tweeted a message claiming that President Barack Obama had been critically injured in a bomb attack at the White House.
On May 3rd it was the turn of satirical website the Onion. The Syrian Electronic Army hacked the website's Twitter account by compromising the Google App accounts of several employees of The Onion.
As The Onion's tech team explained, by sending the following message The SEA were able to obtain the necessary passwords after accessing the email account of an employee who had all the company's social media logins:
But what is the Syrian Electronic Army and why are they attempting to compromise the social media accounts of major media outlets?
The clue is in the name. The group supports embattled Syrian President Bashar al Assad by hacking and spamming the social media accounts of major media organizations.
Although the SEA has only begun to make a name for itself now, it can actually be traced back to 2011.
Virtual army
That year coincided with the outbreak of the rebellion in Syria, and in a speech Assad made a point of thanking a group called the Syrian Electronic Army, describing them as a "virtual army in cyberspace".
That suggests at least some direct collaboration with the regime in Damascus. Interestingly before he inherited the presidency from his father, Assad was head of the Syrian Computer Society which introduced the Internet to his country. Initially the SEA claimed it was an official entity but since then it describes itself as a team of young enthusiasts.
However it seems probable that it is organised centrally unlike a collective such as Anonymous that has no apparent structure.
Their aims all boil down to the control of information. The SEA want to counter what they feel is a negative portrayal of the Assad regime, while also trying to curb any positive news regarding the opposition. That explains the hacking of opposition websites and major media organizations like the Associated Press and the BBC who dissemminate information.
But it is difficult to comprehend what the SEA can achieve in 140 characters or what type of message "Colin was here" is supposed to result in.
The spamming of Facebook pages makes more sense. SEA members have spammed the Facebook pages of Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy, the European Union, al-Jazeera and Human Rights Watch, posting pro-regime messages, similar to the ones you can see below.
Celebrities have also been targets. Oprah Winfrey's Facebook page was hacked because she was deemed to be influential among the US public, despite her non-existent connections to the Syrian conflict.
