Syrian hacktivists took over the BBC Weather Twitter account on Thursday afternoon. Instead of getting the usual updates such as "partly cloudy over the British Isles with a chance of rain later" the 60,000 followers of the @BBCWeather account on Twitter were confronted with a series of bizarre messages. These updates included …

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Thursday 21st March 2013 15:47 GMT Mage

But, But

Why are the BBC wasting time and people on Twitter at all?

They have their own IT and Servers. Why do they continually promote Twitter? Do they think people can't use the Internet?

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2. Thursday 21st March 2013 16:05 GMT John Robson
  
  Re: But, But
  
  From a consumer perspective it's probably nice to have a single reference for all of your "alerts from".
  
  So an idle account which follows all your software providers emergency patch people etc could be handy. Of course you could put it together or use that good old fashioned "e-mail"...
  
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  1. Friday 22nd March 2013 09:22 GMT TeeCee
    
    Re: But, But
    
    From a consumer perspective it's probably nice to have a single reference for all of your "alerts from".
    
    So the point of Tw@ter is actually to provide RSS feeds for those too terminally thick to master the manifold intricacies[1] of subscribing to RSS feeds?
    
    [1] i.e. "click here".
    
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    1. Friday 22nd March 2013 10:06 GMT Charlie Clark
      
      Re: But, But
      
      Two things - RSS has no push mechanism and polling is resource intensive; but I think the real reason for people staying away from RSS is the inability to forward stuff to the friends with important comments like "OMG!", "LOL!", etc.
      
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3. Thursday 21st March 2013 16:52 GMT Petr0lhead
  
  Re: But, But
  
  "Do they think people can't use the Internet?"
  
  Its seems a growing proportion can't - if it ain't on facebook or twitter it doesn't exist.
  
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4. Friday 22nd March 2013 12:51 GMT Wzrd1
  
  Re: But, But
  
  Well, Twitter appears to be ideal for short messages, such as "Rain as usual".
  
  I say appears, as I still refuse to use Twitter.
  
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Thursday 21st March 2013 15:59 GMT Robin

Fish

Weather forecasts involving camels and chemical weapons are probably more accurate than normal ones. I'd imagine.

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1. Thursday 21st March 2013 16:33 GMT Anonymous Coward
  
  @Robin
  
  Just unfortunate that the article doesn't tell if the camel survived the head-on collision, now I won't be able to sleep this evening ;-)
  
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  1. Thursday 21st March 2013 21:00 GMT Tequila Joe
    
    Re: @Robin
    
    ...doesn't tell if the camel survived the head-on collision
    
    Just a couple of bumps. Pretty much as expected with Camel Sense Multiple Arabs with Collision Detection?
    
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2. Thursday 21st March 2013 17:17 GMT JimC
  
  Re: Fish
  
  Poor Fish really doesn't altogether deserve the grief he gets for that. It wasn't a hurricane, it was a very severe storm. As a rule of thumb peak wind speeds in a storm are about double the average wind speed, and the great storm saw peak wind speeds at the same strength as average speed of a hurricane. The peak wind speeds in a real hurricane are far far greater. If we ever get a real hurricane going through southern England the damage will be unbelievable and maybe folk will appreciate a bit better what its like in real hurricane areas...
  
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3. Friday 22nd March 2013 12:53 GMT Wzrd1
  
  Re: Fish
  
  If nothing else, at least one gets a chuckle over such "reports".
  
  It sure beats, "Surprise! Rain again."
  
  Or rain with fog.
  
  Or fog with rain.
  
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Thursday 21st March 2013 16:22 GMT Select * From Handle

I read the title

and i first thought that www.bbc.co.uk./weather had been hijacked, but upon opening the link and seeing the twitter image i was a little disappointed :(

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Thursday 21st March 2013 16:36 GMT ukgnome

At least when in the hands of the miscreants the weather forecast is more accurate.

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Thursday 21st March 2013 16:48 GMT Andy Roid McUser

No need for the twitter feed

Today the weather in Blighty will be cold and shitty, followed by bouts of rain and economic gloom ( repeat )

Today the weather in Syria will be sunny and 20 Deg C, with bouts of bloodshed, oppression and international apathy. ( Same tomorrow )

And in Paris.... well we've all seen the video. Hot and nasty.

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Thursday 21st March 2013 17:20 GMT Anonymous Coward

Skiddlydee

They also hacked Radio Ulster twitter.

Home of Steven Nolan, who tries to get sense from fundamentalist local politicians, and Hugo Duncan, who's first reponse after the budget broadcast yesterday was 'Skiddlydee'.

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Thursday 21st March 2013 19:17 GMT Electric Panda

Again?

This seems to be happening about 320549 times every day now.

I got downvoted the last time for this, but I still believe Twitter needs look at two-factor auth, especially for high profile verified accounts. Either that or set more stringent password requirements.

Downvotes away.

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1. Thursday 21st March 2013 20:06 GMT Mage
  
  Re: Again?
  
  Yes, that's one solution.
  
  The other is to ignore it and facebook leave it to folks that want to be spied on, be egotistical and wash their smalls in public.
  
  If I'm really publishing important stuff, surely people using RSS in their Email Client makes more sense that giving an Advertising Parasite a monopoly. The BBC really needs Twitter to Publish? It's lazy journalists and bad management. Article about Twitter on R5 PM today too.
  
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  1. Friday 22nd March 2013 12:57 GMT Wzrd1
    
    Re: Again?
    
    Now, now. I had a good reason to use Facebook.
    
    While I was deployed, I used Facebook to see pictures of my brand new granddaughter.
    
    Now that I've retired from the military, I have very little use for it. If I want to see my grandchildren, I go and visit them. They're only ten minutes away in heavy traffic. :)
    
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Friday 22nd March 2013 09:10 GMT jai

so it's the Syrian's that are to blame for the snow coming down outside the window this morning? damn their eyes!!!

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Friday 22nd March 2013 09:16 GMT TeeCee

"...a desire to push out propaganda..."

Now the thing about propaganda is that it should be at least vaguely believable to have any effect.

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1. Friday 22nd March 2013 15:03 GMT Yag
  
  Re: "...a desire to push out propaganda..."
  
  Not... Really.
  
  Propaganda is also used to demonize/ridiculize the opposing side and to enhance your own side image (by passing as a bunch of funny fellows for example).
  
  ADDENDUM : Due to the overload of propaganda from both side (the famous Syrian Human Rights Committee is rumored to be nothing more than a propaganda office of the opposition), I'ld prefer NOT starting a flame war on this stuff.
  
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