PANews reported on April 16 that the X account of Lucy Powell, leader of the House of Commons, was hacked and used to promote the fraudulent "House of Commons" cryptocurrency, according to the BBC. On Powell's X account, a series of now-deleted posts described the "HCC" token as "a community-driven digital currency that brings people power to the blockchain." The MP's office confirmed that her account was hacked on Tuesday morning and said that "measures have been taken quickly to protect the account and delete misleading posts." Recently, some public figures with a large number of fans, including BBC reporter Nick Robinson, have also suffered similar online hacker attacks.
Luke Nolan, senior researcher at CoinShares, said the hack of Powell’s account was an example of “pump and dump,” with only 34 trades taking place on the token, which could have resulted in a profit of around £225.