Hackers Post Bogus Report On Obama

A false report claimed U.S. President Barack Obama had been injured in an explosion.

Hackers have broken into the Twitter account of the Associated Press (AP) news agency, posting a false report about explosions at the White House injuring President Barack Obama.

Within a few minutes, AP announced that its Twitter feed had been hacked, and the U.S. agency immediately suspended the account.

It said it was working to correct the issue.

White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters in Washington on April 23 that the president was "fine."

The stock market briefly dropped after the false tweet was posted.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 150 points, before recovering in a few minutes.

A shadowy group calling itself the Syrian Electronic Army claimed responsibility for hacking the AP Twitter account.

The cyberattack is the latest in a string of hacking operations targeting international media organizations.

With reporting by AP and dpa