( CNN ) -- Misinformation can spread quickly on Twitter , each retweet exposing it to wider audiences and even resulting in real world impacts . On Tuesday , hackers took over the Associated Press Twitter account and falsely claimed that there had been explosions at the White House and that the president was hurt . The tweet was up for a few minutes and retweeted more than 3,000 times before Twitter took the account offline . The AP immediately confirmed the news was not true , but the tweet was up long enough to send a shudder through the stock market , which plunged 143 points before recovering . Real tweets have the power to end careers , cause diplomatic tensions , fuel a revolution and find a kidney . Fake tweets can have the same ripple effects , and damage control is difficult . There is no way to edit or append a correction to a tweet , and once it has been retweeted , those 140 characters take on a life of their own . A follow-up tweet with the correct information might not be seen by the same people . `` You want to respond as quickly as possible . Deleting the tweet is a good approach , but even if you delete it it 's obviously already out there , '' said social media expert Krista Neher . The AP incident is not the first time a tweet has influenced markets . In August 2012 , an Italian journalist set up a fake Twitter account for a member of Russia 's government and tweeted that the president of Syria had been killed , causing brief fluctuations in the oil markets . The journalist was an experienced Twitter hoaxer , having previously posted fake tweets about the death of the pope and Fidel Castro and established a number fake accounts for world leaders . He claimed he did it to prove how unreliable social media is for getting accurate news . A tweet does n't just trigger financial panic , it can also strain diplomatic relations , as the U.S. Embassy in Cairo found out in April when the official Twitter account posted a link to a Daily Show segment critical of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi . In March , someone posing as the U.S. ambassador to Moscow tweeted a criticism of the Russian presidential election process , which was picked up by the news media in Russia before it was revealed as a hoax . The U.S. government responded with official statements in both incidents . `` The speed at which information spreads is so much quicker than it used to be , and Twitter is such a big part of that , '' said Neher . That was painfully evident late Thursday night during the manuhunt in Boston . A tweet mistakenly named a missing Brown University student as one of the suspects . Twitter latched on to the name and many users assumed it was true even though it had n't been confirmed by authorities . A faulty tweet also can have a negative impact on community or a family . Late last year a New Jersey teenager posted a plea for help on Twitter saying there was an intruder in her house and asking people to call 911 . The tweet went viral as friends and strangers expressed genuine concern for her safety ( though no one on Twitter actually called 911 ) . But it was quickly discovered that there was no home invasion . The teen had run away from home and was later spotted on security cameras buying a train ticket to New York City . The fast-moving , viral nature of Twitter has its perils , but it can also be used for good . Twitter highlights the impact of single tweets in its Twitter Stories series , tracking Tweets that go viral and result in positive impacts and happy endings .
A fake tweet can spread across the social network and into the real world quickly . A tweet from a hacked AP account resulted in a crash in the stock market . There is no way to edit or take back a message and deleting is ineffective once it is in the system .