DURBAN – The ANC KwaZulu-Natal’s Facebook page has been hacked.
This was according to sources and was later confirmed by the ANC KZN on Sunday night.
As a result, the ANC KZN has warned the public that its Facebook page was recently hacked.
After visiting the page, the Daily News found that the last post which appeared authentic was on February 15, when the ANC provincial chairperson, Sihle Zikalala, in his capacity as KZN premier, alongside legislature speaker, Nontembeko Boyce, concluded a two-day Zulu royal family visit.
On Sunday, a post was made on the page ANC KZN was live for more than seven hours. It was captioned “dsfdsfsdf”.
By Monday morning, the post had received 29 Facebook reactions, 36 comments and was shared six times.
The ANC KZN said the hackers seemed to have gained access to the page’s security settings and removed all admin personnel who were members of the ANC’s Department of Information and Publicity.
The ANC understands that the hackers were also attempting to report the page to Facebook to get it taken down.
ANC KZN spokesperson Nhlakanipho Ntombela said they condemned the act of cyberbullying in the strongest possible terms. It was disturbing and unacceptable.
“Our political opponents are clearly threatened by the popularity of the page, which had become the ANC KZN’s trusted voice and authority on information. The ANC has been a target of a plethora of attacks over time, and, in hindsight, it was a matter of time before our enemies and enemies of progressive forces resorted to this kind of sabotage,” Ntombela said.
“We are appealing to the public to be circumspect when engaging with the page in its current form, and not to interact with it or accede to any pleas that the hijackers of our page might make, including requests for money transfers, as per popular modus operandi that hackers tend to employ.”
“We also want the doers of such nefarious deeds to know that we will not be intimidated or deterred by their actions and that every dog has its day. One day, the law will catch up with them, and there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth,” Ntombela said.
Since the page was created, it has grown in popularity and reached just under 80 000 followers. The growth was attributable to the delivery of authentic, interesting and relevant content; which had made it a reliable source of information for the public, as well as major local and international news outlets.
Ntombela said that they were working around the clock to rectify the security breach. The ANC in KZN would provide an update on the matter in due course.
Daily News