Christopher Pyne blames hacker on porn ‘like’
FEDERAL cabinet minister Christopher Pyne has shrugged off hackers who used his Twitter account to “like” a gay pornography website, saying the incident was ‘annoying and embarrassing’.
NSW
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FEDERAL cabinet minister Christopher Pyne has shrugged of the hacking of his Twitter account, saying it’s a good reminder to keep changing passwords.
The defence industry minister also said there were no implications for national security after the hacked account was used to “like” a gay pornography website.
“It’s a good reminder to us all, quite frankly. We need to keep changing our passwords and being aware of not anybody out there wishes us goodwill, unfortunately,” he told the Nine Network today, adding that the incident was annoying as well as embarrassing.
It was feared the hacking could spark an investigation into whether national security has been compromised by unnamed foreign powers.
The Defence Industries Minister’s account liked the lewd video at 2am yesterday, prompting Australian Conservatives senator Cory Bernardi to call for Parliament to investigate if defence secrets had been put at risk.
The snafu is the latest in a long line of social media debacles to confront politicians, with Texan Republican Ted Cruz in September blaming a similar ‘liking’ of a pornographic video on Twitter on one of his aides.
Senator Bernardi, no fan of Mr Pyne, said he nevertheless sympathised with him.
“I’m deeply concerned about national security implications of (the) hacking of Pyne’s social media account,” Senator Bernardi said.
“Who looks at gay porn at 2am, on the day that the gay marriage thing gets up.”
Labor leader Bill Shorten appeared to back an investigation after Mr Pyne said his account had been hacked overnight and suggesting it was related to his support for gay marriage.
“I think it is most serious when any minister, but especially a defence minister, is the victim of hacking and I do think we need to get to the bottom of this,” the Opposition leader said.
More than 100 circumspect Twitter users yesterday responded within hours of Mr Pyne trying to pour cold water on the situation, with several pointing out the peculiar tactic of hacking an account to “like” one rogue tweet.
Mr Pyne’s office said there were “no defence or national security implications” and that Facebook had yesterday alerted them to an attempt to breach his Facebook account.
“The account in question was a public online social media account, not a Defence, government or parliamentary social media account,” a spokesman said. “These things are not uncommon, for example the Treasurer suffered a similar incident last year as did the Foreign Minister in 2014.
“It’s a reminder to all of us that not everyone out there wishes us good will, to routinely change passwords and to be mindful of cyber security.”
But cybersecurity researcher Nick Patterson said the ease of stealing Twitter usernames and passwords meant “humans are seen as a major weak point in the cyber security chain”.
“A hacked Twitter account could mean evidence that your computer is hacked and a hacker is in your system watching your activities,” he said.