Modi website's Twitter account gets hacked, seeks cryptocurrency donations

TWITTER confirmed on Thursday (3) that an account of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's personal website was hacked, with a series of tweets asking its followers to donate to a relief fund through cryptocurrency.

The incident comes after several Twitter accounts of prominent personalities were hacked in July.

According to reports, the hacker put out messages seeking donations to the Prime Minister's Relief Fund for Covid-19 using bitcoins.

Twitter said it was aware of the activity with Modi's website account and took steps to secure it.

"We are actively investigating the situation. At this time, we are not aware of additional accounts being impacted," a Twitter spokeswoman said in an emailed statement.

Modi's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the tweets posted on the account @narendramodi_in.

The account, with over 2.5 million followers, is the official Twitter handle for Modi's personal website (https://www.narendramodi.in/) and the Narendra Modi mobile application.

Modi's personal Twitter account, which was unaffected by this incident, has over 61 million followers.

The tweets, which have since been taken down, asked the followers to donate to the PM National Relief Fund through cryptocurrency.

Hackers had in July accessed Twitter's internal systems to hijack some of the platform's top voices including US presidential candidate Joe Biden, former US president Barack Obama and billionaire Elon Musk, and used them to solicit digital currency.

Incidentally, Modi's account was hacked within a day after India banned 118 more Chinese amid a bitter border showdown between the giant neighbours.

The government said the apps -- including the popular video game PUBG and other services provided by Chinese internet giant Tencent -- promoted activities "prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order".