Crypto Hackers Breach India’s Supreme Court YouTube Channel

India’s Supreme Court YouTube channel was hacked for several hours on Friday to perpetrate what was believed to be a crypto scam.

The development came amid a rising trend of hacks targeting prominent social media accounts in India to advertise cryptocurrency scams. It follows recent incidents involving the Hyderabad Metro and Indian Hockey team’s X accounts, which malicious actors compromised on September 18 to promote a dubious token on Solana named “$HACKED.”

On September 20, local media outlets reported that the incident came to light when the YouTube channel showcased a blank video titled Brad Garlinghouse: Ripple Responds To The SEC’s $2 Billion Fine! XRP PRICE PREDICTION.

Brad Garlinghouse is the CEO of Ripple Labs, the company that created XRP to facilitate crypto-based cross-border payments. The company is currently embroiled in a long-running legal dispute with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Per one report, the hackers appeared to have rebranded the YouTube Channel. They made all its previous videos private to add credibility to a fake livestream video featuring Garlinghouse encouraging viewers to invest in the scam.

Later in the day, India’s Supreme Court technology registrar, Hargurvarinder Singh Jaggi, confirmed the hack and informed the public that the channel had been taken down.

“This is to inform all concerned that the YouTube channel of Supreme Court of India has been taken down.

The services on YouTube channel of Supreme Court of India will be resumed shortly,” Jaggi said in a notice.

The Supreme Court created the channel in 2018 to live-stream proceedings of all constitutional bench hearings. At the time of this writing, the channel was still down.