Kansas City Chiefs Among 15 Teams Whose Social Media Accounts Were Hacked
The Kansas City Chiefs were among 15 NFL teams that had their social media accounts hacked on Monday. The realization of the hacking came slowly but eventually, it was confirmed a group known as OurMine was responsible.
Business Insider reports the hacking started on Twitter but eventually spread to Instagram and Facebook. The takeover of the social media accounts began when the teams started tweeting out odd messages.
Users soon noticed the profile image and banners disappeared. All of the hacks seemed to have taken place in a matter of hours; the attacks appear to be over for now.
In a message posted shortly after the accounts were taken over, the group claiming responsibility issued a statement using the Kansas City Chiefs’ Twitter profile, among others. The message claimed OurMine had carried out the attacks in order to show that everyone and everything is hackable.
The post went on to offer advice on how people could protect their accounts from hackers. The post also linked back to a Twitter account that was since blocked and suspended by the social media site.
While neither the NFL nor Twitter was willing to comment officially, Kurt Wagner, a reporter from Bloomberg, tweeted that his sources had confirmed the incident, as well as the perpetrator.
According to Wagner, once the Chiefs and the rest of the teams affected realized what was happening, they had Twitter immediately freeze the accounts. Eventually, sources were able to confirm the Arizona Cardinals, Chicago Bears, Buffalo Bills, Dallas Cowboys, Cleveland Browns, Green Bay Packers, Dallas Cowboys, Houston Texans, Denver Broncos, Los Angeles Chargers, Philadelphia Eagles, Indianapolis Colts, New York Giants, and the Philadelphia Eagles were all hacked.
The team that will face off against the Chiefs in this coming weekend’s Super Bowl was also affected. The San Francisco 49ers were the 15th team to have its Twitter account affected by OurMine.
This is hardly the first time the group has done this kind of thing. It’s well known for going after high profile social media accounts. They are thought to be behind the hacking of Sony, as well as prominent people such as Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Channing Tatum.
They’ve also gone after websites such as Business Insider. Now that the attack appears to be over, the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers can turn their focus to the big game on Sunday. It’s the first Super Bowl for KC since Super Bowl IV. It’s the 49er’s first appearance in the game since 2013’s Super Bowl XLVII.
