Pro-Assad group hacks Obama's social media account

A pro-Bashar al-Assad group, the Syrian Electronic Army, has hacked President Barack Obama's social media account.

Later the group claimed responsibility for the attack on Twitter.

According to a report, the security breach led to the verified Obama Twitter and Facebook pages being linked to an online video containing propaganda about the Syrian civil war.

The report said, links containing a shortened ofa.bo address directing visitors to a YouTube video about the ongoing conflict in Syria between forces loyal to Assad and resistance groups.

Meanwhile, the White House has declined to comment in the matter.

Link shorteners abbreviate web links to fit in a tweet  which is limited to 140 characters.

Obama's Facebook and Twitter pages carried links that were intended to take readers to a Washington Post story on immigration, which due to the hack, re-directed readers to a video of the Syrian conflict instead.

Obama does not himself tweet from the @BarackObama Twitter handle, which is run by his backer called Organizing for Action, but on the rare occasion that he does, they are signed with his initials.

The Syrian Electronic Army tweeted, "We accessed many Obama campaign emails (sic) accounts to assess his terrorism capabilities. They are quite high."

The Syrian Electronic Army which had coordinated several high-profile hacking attempts in the US, appeared in September, to have struck a recruiting website for the US Marine Corps.

The FBI  has warned that the group might intensify its internet attacks as the US had once considered a military strike against Syria in response to an alleged chemical weapons attack by the Syrian government against its people.

The group also targeted the website of The New York Times. Syria has been locked in a civil war from March 2011, which appeared to be in a stalemate for now.

The conflict started as uprising against four decades of Assad family rule, with Sunni Muslim rebels opposed to president, Bashar al-Assad, whose Alawite faith is an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.