Someone has hijacked the X account of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, and posted an announcement saying the agency has decided to allow the listing of Bitcoin ETFs on registered national security exchanges.
The fake announcement was posted on Tuesday, a little after 4 p.m. EST, and was removed less than 30 minutes after, but was picked up by news outlets that were waiting for a decision on the matter to be made by the US markets' regulator.
As a consequence, the price of Bitcoin spiked for a short while, before tumbling again soon after.
SEC's decision on this particular matter is expected by Wednesday, which is why the fake announcement was taken at face value by many.
After the post was removed, both the SEC and SEC chairman Gary Gensler said that the account had been compromised and an unauthorized tweet had been posted.
The hijacking of SEC's X account comes after a slew of account breaches targeting prominent tech companies and security firms such as Netgear and Mandiant.
Those compromised accounts had been made to promote bogus cryptocurrency sites and wallet drainer malware.
This Cyber News was published on www.helpnetsecurity.com. Publication date: Wed, 10 Jan 2024 14:13:15 +0000