X crash, Tesla trouble, DOGE attacks — Is Musk’s empire under siege?

Elon Musk seems to be having a rough time. From Tesla stock taking a hit and showrooms being vandalised to DOGE-related attacks, now X is experiencing massive outages. The platform has been struggling all morning, with users unable to refresh their feeds or post content. Musk has blamed a large-scale cyberattack, but security experts suggest something more complex is at play. Here’s a breakdown of the chaos surrounding Musk’s empire and what’s causing these disruptions.

X has been glitching all day long

Users worldwide woke up to X refusing to load. Feeds wouldn’t refresh, timelines were stuck, and error messages like “Something went wrong. Try reloading” kept popping up. The issue affected mobile and desktop users alike.

According to Downdetector, the first major outage started around 5:40 AM ET yesterday, with intermittent disruptions continuing throughout the day. Some users even reported Cloudflare error messages, suggesting that X’s infrastructure was struggling to cope with the load.

Hackers claim responsibility

Musk quickly attributed the outages to a “massive cyberattack,” claiming that the attack originated from Ukraine and could involve a “large, coordinated group and/or a country.” However, cyber experts caution that denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks—if that’s what this is—are hard to trace, and IP addresses don’t necessarily reveal the real attackers.

Check Point Research (CPR) has revealed that the pro-Palestinian Dark Storm Team has already taken responsibility for the attack. This group, in the past, has targeted several Western entities and recently hit critical infrastructure, including the Los Angeles International Airport, Haifa Port in Israel, and the UAE’s Ministry of Defence.

Denial-of-service attacks are disruptive but hard to trace

DDoS attacks work by overwhelming a website with massive amounts of fake traffic, effectively clogging up its servers. They don’t require sophisticated hacking skills, but they can be incredibly effective at causing widespread disruptions.

Sources in the internet infrastructure industry say X has been hit by multiple waves of such attacks since around 9:45 UTC. However, tracing the exact source of these attacks is tricky, as the IP addresses used are often random or spoofed.

The chaos doesn’t end with X

Musk’s problems go beyond just X. Tesla is also dealing with a rough week—showrooms have been vandalised, and its stock price has taken a dive. Meanwhile, attacks on Dogecoin-related services have added another layer of disruption.

With all these crises hitting at once, Musk’s companies are under significant pressure. Whether the X outage was a coordinated cyberattack or simply an internal failure, it’s yet another setback in what’s shaping up to be a rough period for Musk.