A pro-ISIS hacker group calling itself CyberCaliphate took responsibility for infiltrating the Twitter accounts of Newsweek, a Maryland television station, and other news organizations this week while also threatening President Barack Obama and his family.
"Bloody Valentine's Day #MichelleObama! We're watching you, you girls and your husband!" read a messages tweeted out repeatedly on Newsweek's account.
According to CNN, CyberCaliphate claims to have ties to the Islamic State and took responsibility for hacking the Twitter account of U.S. Central Command earlier this year.
"At 10:45 a.m. (Tuesday), the Newsweek Twitter account, @Newsweek, was hacked by a group calling themselves the
CyberCaliphate," read a statement on Newsweek's website. "The group claimed to be affiliated with the Islamic State . . . The Newsweek account remained hacked for 14 minutes until 10:59 a.m., when Twitter's support team regained control of the account at the publication's request."
Newsweek's managing editor Kira Bindrim confirmed that things had returned to normal.
"We apologize to our readers for anything offensive that might have been sent from our account during that period, and are working to strengthen our newsroom security measures going forward," Bindrim said in a statement.
Reuters reported that CyberCaliphate posted a message that appeared to be in retaliation to U.S. military involvement in the Middle East.
"While the U.S. and its satellites are killing our brothers in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, we are destroying your national cyber security system from inside," the CyberCaliphate message read, according to Reuters. The news agency said the message had a list of names under the headline
"brave mujahideen."
Newsweek reported that it appeared that the same group posted Twitter messages threatening first lady Michelle Obama. The International Business Times website and Newsweek's Tumblr website were also hacked at roughly the same time, according to Newsweek.
The FBI has started an investigation into the hack as well as the Twitter post threatening the president's family.
WBOC-TV in Maryland issued a Twitter post around 9:30 a.m. Tuesday stating its account was also hacked by CyberCaliphate, and warned its viewers to disregard any messages.
"We're CyberCaliphate! With Allah's permission we're coming for you! You'll see no mercy infidel!" read one of the posts penned by the group on the station's account.
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