Donald Trump is receiving backlash from the cybersecurity community after he claimed that “nobody gets hacked” unless it’s by “somebody with 197 IQ.”
On Monday during a campaign event in Tuscon, Arizona, Trump made the comment while referring to C-SPAN political editor Steve Scully, who falsely claimed that his Twitter account was hacked.
“Nobody gets hacked. To get hacked, you need somebody with 197 IQ and he needs about 15% of your password,” said Trump.
A video of Trump’s comments quickly went viral on Twitter, prompting outrage from the cybersecurity professionals who described his words as “dumb” and “dangerous”.
Shortly after, Trump’s campaign website appeared to fall victim to hackers Tuesday night.
“This site was seized,” read a message that was posted on the homepage at donaldjtrump.com. The “world has had enough of the fake news spread daily” by Donald Trump, it added.
The message said it had information that “discredits” Trump and his family, and it demanded cryptocurrency to either release or withhold the information.
The website then appeared to go offline and was shortly restored without the hacked message moments later.
Tim Murtaugh, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, said the “website was defaced and we are working with law enforcement authorities to investigate the source of the attack.” He added, “There was no exposure to sensitive data because none of it is actually stored on the site,” he said. “The website has been restored.”
Despite Trump’s contradictory statements, he appears to have forgotten that his hotel chain was hacked on two different occasions between 2014 and 2017. Hotel guests had their credit card data stolen during the hacks, and Trump’s hotel chain was legally required to notify regulators.
In February 2013, Trump admitted that his own Twitter account was hacked, the perpetrator posting the Will.I.Am lyrics “These hoes think they classy, well that’s the class I’m skippen”.
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