Hackers launch fake broadcast about cryptocurrency on Apple’s YouTube channel

After the official presentation of the new iPhone, cryptocurrency fraudsters seized the moment and launched a fake live broadcast on Apple’s fake YouTube channel, which was viewed by tens of thousands of users in a few hours.

As it became known, the hackers used an old interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook conducted by CNN journalists in 2018 to create the fake live stream. The broadcast was titled «Apple Event Live. Apple CEO Tim Cook: Apple and the Metaverse in 2022». In the video, the CNN channel label was closed with the text «Apple Crypto Event 2022», the logos of bitcoin and ethereum and the phrase «breaking news» were added. Below the video was a link to the allegedly official Apple LIVE page, but the URL had nothing to do with Apple.

Since only a few hours had passed since the iPhone 14 presentation on the fake channel, the fraudsters managed to bring the video to the top of YouTube search results. All thanks to a set of Apple-related keywords. Some viewers who had been actively interested in Apple topics before were recommended to watch the broadcast on the homepage.

Thus, by creating a fake channel and uploading a 4-year-old video, the hackers managed to deceive not only users but also YouTube’s security measures. At the time of writing, YouTube representatives have not commented on the incident, but it is clear that the platform should reconsider how it verifies videos and live streams before publishing them.

As a reminder, a few days ago, hackers managed to hack the South Korean government’s YouTube channel and rename it SpaceX Invest to publish a deepfake video in which Elon Musk allegedly discusses cryptocurrencies.