'I thought it only happened to the Guptas': celebs terrorised by hackers

11 July 2017 - 14:14 By Kyle Zeeman
subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now
Dineo Ranaka lost control of her Twitter account on Monday.
Dineo Ranaka lost control of her Twitter account on Monday.
Image: JAMES OATWAY

Some of Mzansi's biggest radio stars including Kuli Roberts, Mo-G and Dineo Ranaka have been hit by a cyber attack that left their social media pages useless and out of their control.

Speaking to TshisaLIVE, Dineo said that she was hit by the attack during her radio show this week, with the hackers changing the details of her account and locking her out.

"They changed the email associated with my account and then later sent me an email demanding that I hand over my Instagram password. They didn't want money. I think they just wanted my 891,000 followers on Twitter and 386,000 followers on Instagram," Dineo said.

She said that the scariest part was watching her account change before her eyes.

"It was so distressing to have something like this happen. It was the last thing I expected. This shows the need for celebrities to be verified to add that layer of security," she said.

It was this desire to get verified that saw Dineo's fellow Metro FM DJ Mo-G lose access to his account.

"I sent a mail to Twitter to request verification and I got a response from what seemed like Twitter asking for my password and account details to verify me. I handed it over and never heard back. I couldn't access my Twitter account from Sunday but thought it was a technical issue with Twitter.

"I woke up on Monday and my account had changed. It was suddenly tweeting random promotional posts and encouraging people to do things that I would never ask my fans to do. I spoke to Twitter immediately and they shut it down. I thought that hacking only happened to the Guptas," Mo-G said.

Although attempts to contact Kuli Roberts were unsuccessful, the star took to Instagram on Monday evening to reveal that she too had been hacked. She has apparently reached out to security experts to gain control of her account again, after imposters changed her details and then wiped her account clean.

READ MORE:

subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now