Channel Seven hit by major AI hack

Channel Seven appears to have been hacked — with all of its videos now made to look like a Tesla channel with a live stream of an AI Elon Musk.

All of Channel Seven’s YouTube’s pages appear to have been hacked — with all of its videos now made to look like a Tesla channel with a live stream of an AI Elon Musk.

The hack appears to be affecting all of Seven’s YouTube pages, including 7 News, Spotlight and the old Today Tonight channel.

All videos have been replaced with a live video of Musk with an AI-generated version of his voice suggesting that users go to a website to deposit Ethereum, Dogecoin, or Bitcoin.

The clip promises viewers that depositing their cryptocurrency on the site would “automatically send back double the amount of the cryptocurrency you deposited.”

The stream ran for 5 hours, and at one point had over 45,000 concurrent viewers, bringing it to the top of YouTube’s Live Now recommendations.

Seven’s main YouTube landing site appears to now be unavailable with an error message appearing.

Channel Seven’s YouTube pages have been hacked.

Hackers likely chose Mr Musk to deepfake and promote the site as Tweets fromthe Tesla CEO have been known to have a significant impact on the crypto market, especially with meme coins such as Dogecoin, thanks to his dedicated following.

In 2020, Musk was one of several high-profile Twitter users—a group that also included Bill Gates, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden—who was briefly hacked to promote a Bitcoin scam.

A Seven spokeswoman said: “Seven is aware that some of its branded YouTube channels are not appearing as they should. Seven is investigating and working with YouTube to resolve the situation as soon as possible.”

Rough week for Seven

The hack comes after a tough week for Seven — as the network revealed a mass round of redundancies in an attempt to cut costs.

A popular Seven presenter has lost his job in the cuts.

According to the Gold Coast Bulletin, weather reporter Paul Burt, who became a fan favourite during his 11-year stint broadcasting for both the Gold Coast and Brisbane stations, has been sacked.

He is just one of around 150 staff who has reportedly been let go from the embattled network in recent days.

Burt was a very familiar face on Queensland television, also hosting his own fishing and adventure show, 7Mate’s Step Outside with Paul Burt.

His television career first launched at Channel 10, before he made the jump to Nine. He ended up at Seven eight years later.

Burt went viral in 2022 after famously interrupting his own live cross to race into the ocean at Surfer’s Paradise and rescue a struggling young boy.

The clip went viral. Picture: Seven

The mass redundancies – part of a wider cost-cutting exercise – were announced this week.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, they were not limited to any single division – with journalists across all sectors, as well as sales and marketing positions, all on the chopping block.

‘A massacre’

There has also been a “massacre” within the senior executive ranks of the network — a move that has shocked industry watchers, who say it’s a sign of just how serious the crisis is at the network – and in television broadly.

Seven West Media chairman Kerry Stokes, the billionaire media magnate who owns a controlling share of the network, oversaw a brutal clearing out of his nine-person management team on Tuesday.

Billionaire Kerry Stokes’ media business is in serious trouble.

Kurt Burnette, chief revenue officer at Seven, was axed in a shock move yesterday.

Chief marketing and audience officer Melissa Hopkins joined Seven barely a year ago.

Industry veteran Kurt Burnette, who was the chief revenue officer, Melissa Hopkins, chief marketing and audience officer, and Lewis Martin, head of network sport and Melbourne managing director, were all sent packing.

Prominent industry commentator Tim Burrowes, publisher of the Unmade newsletter, described it as “one of the most dramatic days the media market has seen”.

“Factor in the departure of CEO James Warburton, legal chief Bruce McWilliam and news chief Craig McPherson in April, and the leadership of Australia’s most watched TV network has changed almost entirely in just two months,” Burrowes pointed out.

“Among Australia’s big media companies, that’s unprecedented.”

The company described it as a necessary part of a massive restructure, while Burrowes called it a “massacre”.

— More to come

— with Shannon Molloy and Bronte Coy