Wilson Rothman , NBC News – 1 hr.
Following a hack attack by an unknown perpetrator, the Associated Press' verified Twitter account posted "an erroneous tweet" claiming that two explosions occurred in the White House and that President Barack Obama is injured. Moments later, the @AP Twitter account — with nearly 2 million followers — was suspended.
Immediately following the false tweet, the Dow Industrial Average lost about 140 points. These losses were immediately recovered. (See chart below.)
"That's a bogus tweet," an AP spokesperson initially told NBC News, a statement that was repeated by the company's corporate communications account. "That's all I have for you right now." Though the initial tweet disappeared, the false message continued to exist on the service in over four thousand retweets.
In a briefing that occurred after the erroneous tweet appeared, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters that "the president is fine, I was just with him." Julie Pace, AP's chief White House correspondent, reiterated during the briefing that "anything that was just sent out about any incident at the White House is actually false."
A wire statement issued later explained that the tweet "came after hackers made repeated attempts to steal the passwords of AP journalists." However, no one has publicly claimed responsibility for the hack.
NBC News has reached out to Twitter for additional comment.
Social media accounts associated with CBS News programs "60 Minutes" and "48 Hours" were compromised on Saturday. It is not clear if Tuesday's hack attack is related to Saturday's.
— with reporting by NBC News' Stacey Klein, Rosa Golijan, Helen Popkin and Patrick Rizzo
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