Tencent Responds to Hacking of Many QQ Accounts

Many users of QQ, a Chinese instant messaging software owned by Tencent, claimed on Sunday night that their accounts had been hacked. The app’s official team responded on Monday that the main reason was that users scanned game login QR codes forged by hackers and authorized account logins, which was recorded and then used by criminals to send illegal ads to the accounts’ contacts. The affected user accounts have been restored to their normal state by the official team.

QQ’s official team apologized for the incident. It added that it was collecting and sorting out criminal evidence, and would cooperate with relevant government departments as needed. The team also reminded users to be vigilant when logging into accounts in an infrequent environment to prevent the risk of hacking.

Given the online posts of QQ users, many were affected, including users of Android, HarmonyOS and iOS across China. Once an account was hacked, it automatically sent pornographic and gambling content to the contacts.

QQ is an instant messaging software service created by Tencent. On March 23 this year, Tencent released its financial report for Q4, 2021 and the total fiscal year of 2021, showing that as of December 31, 2021, the monthly active accounts using QQ with mobile devices were 552 million, down 7.2% year-on-year.

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