Treasury hacked after opening account on Discord | Political News

His Majesty’s Treasury opened a Discord account on the instant messaging platform and was met with a flood of abuse.

The government ministry’s official Twitter account posted a link to its server on the chat app on Tuesday, though it had apparently been active since Oct. 14.

Discord allows users to communicate with voice calls, video calls, text messages, media and files in private chats or as part of communities called “servers”.

Despite the Treasury blocking all comments on the platform, which is mainly popular with gamers, users have gotten creative, using emojis alongside their usernames to mock the government, the Conservatives and the chancellor jeremy hunt.

Emojis can be used to react to posts, which has led to a flood of eggplants, middle fingers, transgender flags and EU flags appearing in the chat. Alphabet emoji replies also saw many users post offensive misspellings of Mr Hunter’s surname.

In addition to emoji reactions, users who join the chat receive a welcome message with their username, prompting a flood of messages from those who have already created one, such as: “Welcome, lock down Prince Andrew. We want you to bring ordered pizza”; “F*** THE TORIES just came on the server”; and “Margaret Thatcher just showed up”.

Discord takes a community-focused approach, with users joining servers dedicated to discussing video games, movies, and podcasts or specific interests and issues, including day trading and cryptocurrencies.

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A Treasury spokesperson said: “Discord is used by a younger audience who would not normally watch our content on other, more established channels.

“It’s important for the government to keep trying to reach new audiences to communicate our policy, even if it means sticking with it.”

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