Hacked NYT tweet claims Russia will attack US with missiles

New York: After apparently being hacked, a Twitter account belonging to the New York Times reported that Russia intended to launch a missile attack against the US. The newspaper has announced that it was investigating the situation.

The gaffe affected the NYT`s video account, @nytvideo, which tweeted out the hoax on Sunday at around 9.40 a.m, citing a "leaked statement" from Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Though the alarming tweet was quickly deleted, others followed that were claimed by the hacker group OurMine, which has previously taken responsibility for hijacking a number of high-profile accounts on social media.

OurMine said it had "re-hacked" the account in order to stem the spread of misinformation after noticing that it had been broken into by a third party. Their messages were eventually deleted too.

The newspaper later confirmed that it had deleted a number of tweets published by @nytvideo "without authorisation", saying, without elaboration, that it was investigating the situation.