A backlit computer keyboard is seen in this illustration photo. (OSV News/Reuters/Kacper Pempel)
by John Grosso
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Catholic News Agency is the latest victim of the social media destabilization besieging platforms like X.
On Monday evening (Jan. 20), the media outlet, a service of EWTN, suddenly posted on X (formerly Twitter) about an emergent cryptocurrency, titled $Holy, and advertised as the "Official Catholic Coin … officially live on the Solana blockchain!"
The now-deleted Jan. 20 post on Catholic News Agency's official X account is seen in this screengrab. (NCR screengrab/X/@cnalive)
The now deleted post (seen below) references the cryptocurrency launched by Donald Trump that potentially increased the net wealth of the now 47th president of the United States by tens of billions of dollars. President Trump launched his cryptocurrency on the Friday before his inauguration.
By 10 p.m. EST, about two hours after the initial post, the tweet was deleted and Catholic News Agency had released a statement alerting readers that the account had been "compromised" and that they were working with the X support team to take control of the account.
The post received enormous engagement, with over 108,000 views, 370 comments, and hundreds of likes and retweets in the short time it was active.
Even for seasoned digital media natives, it is getting harder and harder to discern reality from fiction on social media. Before Catholic News Agency issued the clarification, commenters were initially divided, with some mocking the absurdity of a Catholic entity launching a cryptocurrency, while others lauding the platform for following Trump's lead. Others identified it as a scam.
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Even on their clarification post, dozens of commenters expressed skepticism that the event was a con perpetuated by the news outlet, accusing Catholic News Agency of "rugging" (scamming) them, and calling for a "CTO" (community takeover) of the coin. Other commenters made reference to an alleged profit of over $60,000 made on the coin, although the National Catholic Reporter was unable to independently verify that number.
The situation remains ongoing — and it is unclear as to why hackers would target the Catholic News Agency account, though the timing is curious given the recent high-profile "meme coin" launches by both Donald and Melania Trump, both of which debuted just prior to the 47th president taking office with the promise of ushering in the golden age of cryptocurrency.
