By Robert Mackey

Reuters reports that a hacker briefly seized control of the news agency’s technology news Twitter feed, @ReutersTech, and used the account to post a stream of fabricated reports about Syria and the Middle East under the new handle @ReutersME.

The stunt appeared to be the second step in a campaign by supporters of President Bashar al-Assad to use the news agency’s Internet feeds to spread false information about the conflict in Syria. On Friday, Reuters was forced to temporarily shut down part of its website after the agency’s blogging platform was hacked and fabricated reports of setbacks for Syrian rebels were posted on Reuters.com.

Before the Twitter feed was taken offline, several bloggers managed to capture screenshots of the stream of fake news headlines posted on the social network. According to a cache of the updates on Topsy, which tracks Twitter use, 22 messages were posted on the short-lived @ReutersME feed.

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Source: The New York Times