In another potential activist protest strike at President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, a pro-Hamas hackers group has reportedly taken credit for a massive distributed denial-of-service attack on Musk's X social media platform.
A Telegram post alleges the Dark Storm Team hacking group claims to have targeted X in a DDoS attack.
"There was (still is) a massive cyberattack against 𝕏," Musk wrote on X, responding to a DOGE coin creator's post decrying anti-Trump and Musk protests. "We get attacked every day, but this was done with a lot of resources.
"Either a large, coordinated group and/or a country is involved. Tracing …"
A DOGE/X coding expert decried the liberal activism aimed at Musk.
"First, protests against DOGE," DogeDesigner X account wrote, prompting the quick Musk reply. "Then, Tesla stores were attacked. Now, 𝕏 is down. I wouldn't rule out the possibility that this downtime is the result of an attack on 𝕏."
Dark Storm was allegedly created in September 2023, just weeks before the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel. It is reported to be pro-Palestinian and has possible links to Russia.
Users of X have seen broken links and lack of connectivity Monday, as has been reported by hacking and website traffic watchdog Downdetector.
The hack comes amid Trump's hostage envoy Adam Boehler's direct meetings with Hamas terrorists on the release of hostages in Gaza.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday that the attempt wasn't successful.
"That was a one-off situation in which our special envoy for hostages, whose job it is to get people released, had an opportunity to talk directly to someone who has control over these people and was given permission and encouraged to do so. He did so," Rubio told reporters en route to Saudi Arabia.
"As of now, it hasn't borne fruit. Doesn't mean he was wrong to try, but our primary vehicle for negotiations on this front will continue to be Mr. Witkoff and the work he's doing through Qatar," Rubio said, in reference to Trump's special envoy for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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