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Newsweek’s Twitter Account Hacked by ‘Cyber Caliphate’

A group of ISIS sympathizers took control of the publication’s account for about 15 minutes on Tuesday morning.
​A screenshot of the publication’s Twitter account shortly after it was hacked.

​ The Twitter account of Newsweek was hacked on Tuesday morning, apparently by the same group pro-ISIS group who hacked the account of US Central Command.

The hackers, who call themselves #CyberCaliphate, hijacked the account, changing the avatar and banner photo to an ISIS-themed image. They then posted threats to the First Family and and photos of what was purported to be leaked federal documents.

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Tweets posted by the hacked account showed a message from the 'CyberCaliphate.' Images: Screengrabs by Motherboard

On its ​website, the group wrote "With Allah's permission, we continue CyberJihad inside Pentagon's computer networks. Today we publish confidential documents from the US National Cybersecurity Center."

The group posted documents it said were from the Defense Cyber Investigations Training Academy (DCITA), including an internal phone list, an "organization chart" showing internal operations and training certificates. Although Newsweek took the tweets with these documents down, they are still accessible on the Cyber Caliphate's website.

DCITA has not yet confirmed or denied the veracity of these documents. "We are aware of the situation, we are taking it very seriously, we are investigating and we have no further comment," a spokesperson at DCITA told Motherboard.

According to Brian Ries, a real-time news editor at Mashable who formerly managed Newsweek's Twitter account, the publication was warned of similar threats in May 2013.

I used to manage the @Newsweek Twitter account. We were warned in May 2013 by the FBI that Syrian-based hackers wanted to hack it.

— Brian Ries (@moneyries) February 10, 2015

About 15 minutes after the hack began, the account was back under control. Newsweek did not immediately respond to request for comment, but Editor in Chief Jim Impoco joked about the in​cident on Twitter.

Newsweek is the latest news outlet to have its Twitter taken over by hackers. Previous victims include Le Mo​nde, the Associa​ted Press, and Reute​rs.