A few renowned recording artists fell victim to a Twitter hack yesterday. Reports converged around noon ET concerning the compromised feeds of both Australian psych-rockers Tame Impala and actor Jack Black's acoustic duo Tenacious D. This was swiftly followed by the official Twitter pages for Justin Vernon's Bon Iver and even Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards going rogue.
As of press time, it appears the forenamed musicians' accounts have been safely reclaimed. The numerous offensive tweets from the unknown cyber-assailants were deleted and Bon Iver's Twitter, injudiciously renamed during the attack, has recovered its conventional @boniver handle.
The miscreants behind the onslaught at Black and guitarist Kyle Gass' @RealTenaciousD account clearly intended to cause maximum drama. Once seized, the hackers posted a tweet falsely announcing Black's death. Access regained, the comical rock duo tweeted: "WE had our Twitter account hacked. We can assure you that Jack is ALIVE and WELL and that this was a sick 'prank.'"
News Corp Australia's website News.com.au illustrates that this is the most recent in a succession of prominent musical artist's Twitter feeds being held hostage:
"Tenacious D is just the latest in a string of high-profile Twitter hacks -- only days ago, Katy Perry's Twitter account was hacked, with the responsible issuing offensive tweets from her account and accessing unreleased music she had been recording."
Beyond the imprudent death hoax, yesterday's hackers also posted terroristic bomb threats and multiple tweets pointing to other Twitter accounts, possibly their own personal pages.
The Telegraph mentions just some of the celebrities who have unfortunately fallen prey to such spoof schemes in the past, highlighting an occurrence last year when tributes began spontaneously appearing for television artist Tony Hart, a man who had died six years earlier:
"Last year, Twitter got very confused over death of artist Tony Hart -- forgetting he had actually died in 2009. Charlie Sheen, Owen Wilson, Adam Sandler, Eddie Murphy and Morgan Freeman are just some of the famous faces linked to death hoax stories in recent years."
Listen to Bon Iver's "Holocene" below, and go change your band's Twitter password.
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