'Porn attack' during Zoom meeting by Pakistan Embassy in US leaves internet divided

An alleged "porn attack" by unknown cybercriminals during an online meeting of the Pakistan Embassy in the United States (US) has left the internet divided.

As per the details, Ambassador Rizwan Saeed Sheikh on November 18 hosted a virtual town hall meeting with members of the Pakistani community in the US. The aim of the meeting was to engage with Pakistani expats in the US and address their consular-related concerns.
 

The Zoom meeting, however, was interrupted by a "cyberattack playing offensive/obscene material violating all norms of civility and decency", the embassy said in an official statement.
 

"Regrettably, the E-Kacheri [town hall meeting] hosted by the Mission yesterday was interrupted by a cyber-attack playing offensive/obscene material violating all norms of civility and decency [sic]," the statement read.
 

It added that the embassy disconnected the meeting and resumed it shortly after removing the disruptor.
 

"The matter was explained to the participants, who also condemned the incident, which is under investigation. Attempts to politicize, abuse, and exploit a forum purely facilitative for the diaspora, and motivated attempts to twist facts are unfortunate, counterproductive, and should be avoided," it added, maintaining that the embassy remained resolutely committed to serving the diaspora.
 

The statement from Pakistan’s mission in the US came as participants took to social media and alleged that the embassy had “faked” the attack to evade tough questions aimed at the ambassador.

“At the virtual town hall [with] @PakinUSA, I asked Ambassador Sheikh how he could sleep at night representing an autocratic regime that cracked down on pro-democracy activists, targeted women and children, and disappeared HR defenders?” Mehlaqa Samdani, a Pakistani expat who attended the meeting, posted on X.

“Rather than respond as one would to a concerned Pakistani-American, he spoke to me as if I were a representative of the US government. He said and I paraphrase: ‘No country should have the audacity to lecture us on good governance/human rights, especially those who support Israel, those with the largest budget deficits in the world, and those financed by the rest of the world through currency reserves’,” she added.

Samdani went on to claim that the meeting was interrupted when she asked a follow-up question. “When I tried to ask a follow-up question, the town hall was conveniently ‘hacked’ with pornographic material, and the meeting had to be shut down.”

Samdani’s account of the meeting has sparked a debate among netizens over the veracity of the cyberattack.