News Agency Hack Spawns Presidential Assassination Hoax
Hackers broke into a Czech news service site and spread a fake story about an assassination plot against the newly elected president of Slovakia on Tuesday.
“BIS prevented an assassination attempt on the newly elected Slovak President Peter Pelligrine,” the fraudulent headline said, referring to a Czech spy agency, the Security Information Service (BIS). In their rush to post the story, the hackers apparently got a little sloppy: they misspelled the politician’s last name, Pellegrini.
The fake story suggested that Ukrainian citizens, including Ukrainian Chargé d’Affaires Vitaliy Usatyy, planned the murder attempt. It also claimed Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský had commented on the fake plot as well.