Anyone wondering about Elon Musk’s weird videos on their YouTube feed earlier this year should pay attention. Cybercriminals are behind the distribution of the alleged live streams, in which the billionaire is said to rant about Bitcoin and his Twitter exit, among other things. They temporarily hijacked the popular JP Performance YouTube channel and renamed it @theteslaworld to spread their fake videos. Meanwhile, the current channel operators appear to have regained control. The old name has been restored and the usual content seems to have returned at least in part (as of January 2, 2023, 11:00 am).
Operator notified via Instagram
Jean Pierre Kraemer launched his JP Performance YouTube channel in 2012, he focuses on topics related to fast cars. Kraemer turned January 1, 2023, among other things via Instagram to his million followers and there he confirmed the hack. The YouTuber specifically warned against watching the fake live streams shown on his channel and following the links displayed there or even asking for donations. Videos are online fraud. At times, Kraemer had completely lost access to his channel and described the situation as very bad.
It is not the first incident of this kind
At the moment it is not clear how the hackers managed to hijack the JP Performance account. A current statement on the situation is still pending. However, Kraemer explained via Instagram that his team and YouTube immediately tried to fix the problem. The takeover of YouTube channels by cybercriminals is a well-known phenomenon. Attackers specifically look for accounts with a large reach and preferably attack them on public holidays. JP Performance, for example, has a proud following of nearly 2.3 million users. One of the most prominent victims of such attacks is the German YouTuber JulianBam who also took over all of his channels in 2021 lost. Again, hackers distributed fake Elon Musk streams to trick the public into crypto scams.
