10 Social Media Handles Suspended For Issuing Hoax Bomb Threat to Airliners

New Delhi: About 10 social media handles that issued hoax bomb threats to multiple Indian airliners this week have been suspended or blocked by cyber security agencies till now. 

"Handles were "analysed" by a joint team of cyber, aviation security and intelligence agencies following which orders were issued to suspend these accounts as they continued to issue "mindless" threats," officials sources were quoted as saying by the news agency PTI. 

Around 10 social media handles, the majority of them on X, have been suspended or blocked since Monday when these hoax bomb and terrorist attack threats started being sent to virtually all the Indian airliners for both their domestic and international route operations, the sources said.

10 Social Media Handles Blocked For Hoax Bomb Threats

"The agencies have also found some common lines and words used in these fake threats like "bombs", "blood will spread everywhere", "explosive devices", "this is not a joke" and "you will all die" and "bomb rakhwa dia hai" (Hindi for bomb has been placed) among others. The agencies, apart from getting police FIRs registered in each such hoax bomb messages case, have enhanced 'cyber patrolling' on the social media and the dark web to check for possible linkages or trends where threats are being posted online leading to grounding or diversion of the aircraft," PTI quoted official sources said. 

Authorities are conducting an in-depth investigation to uncover the primary email registrations and geographical locations of social media handles that issued threats, some of which may originate from overseas, according to sources.

These findings are being shared with local police departments.

Earlier, in two incidents, fighter jets from Singapore and Canada were deployed to assist Indian planes carrying hundreds of passengers.

These false threats have caused significant inconvenience to passengers, airline crews, and security agencies, affecting airline logistics and operational costs, officials noted.

On Wednesday, Civil Aviation Minister K. Rammohan Naidu stated that law enforcement agencies are actively investigating all bomb threat cases against airlines and that the government is closely monitoring the situation.

A 17-year-old boy from Chhattisgarh has been detained by Mumbai Police in connection with the hoax bomb threats made on the social media platform X, targeting three flights departing from Mumbai on October 14.

(With inputs from PTI)