Two social media accounts run by An Garda Síochána were hacked and a third-party gained “unauthorised access” to promote a cryptocurrency platform, the Garda has confirmed.
The two Garda accounts, @GardaTraffic and @GardaInfo, on social media platform X have a combined following of more than 900,000 people.
Some branding was removed from both accounts and scores of posts about cryptocurrency began to be published from Wednesday night, including links to claim rewards.
The Garda warned the public “not to interact with any content” posted on the accounts, but said it is “satisfied that there is no unauthorised access with any Garda systems and that there is no loss or impact on any Garda data”.
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It said it is carrying out an internal investigation and is working with the social media company to “understand how this unauthorised access has occurred”.
All posts on both accounts have been removed by the platform, but were seen by thousands of people while live.
A warning was being attached to some posts from the profiles due to being linked with another suspended account, which can happen for violations of rules around spam, malicious behaviour and security risks.
The location on both accounts was changed to Amsterdam, the Netherlands, but the @GardaTraffic account, which has 600,000 followers, still claims it is the Garda account for traffic and road safety updates.
The @GardaInfo account, which has almost 300,000 followers, was rebranded to appear to be the support account for a cryptocurrency wallet.
The name of the account has since been changed to a single fullstop, with posts promoting the wallet having been removed. The X account is still linked to by the official Garda website. – Additional reporting, PA
