Barack Obama Hacked on Twitter
Yesterday it was phishing attacks and an iPhone affiliate offer that were flooding Twitter.
Today… Twitter’s top accounts are being hacked. Some are posting tweets meant to insult or ruin the reputation of the hacked individual.
In the case of the largest account on Twitter, belonging to President Barack Obama, the hackers placed another affiliate link.
Here is a screenshot of the affiliate offer that was linked in the tweet:
Obama’s people were all over this and the tweet was actually removed within minutes of people posted.
Other top celebrities were also hacked today. Here are some of the screenshots taken of the hacker’s tweets:
Twitter has published a post on their blog indicating that “the issue with these 33 accounts is different from the Phishing scam aimed at Twitter users this weekend. These accounts were compromised by an individual who hacked into some of the tools our support team uses to help people do things like edit the email address associated with their Twitter account when they can’t remember or get stuck. ”
Update: Wired scored an interview with the kid who hacked the accounts, in which he explains how and why he hacked @crystal, a Twitter support staff member.
“The hacker, who goes by the handle GMZ, told Threat Level on Tuesday he gained entry to Twitter’s administrative control panel by pointing an automated password-guesser at a popular user’s account. The user turned out to be a member of Twitter’s support staff, who’d chosen the weak password “happiness.”
Here is a video the hacker made of him inside the hacked accounts:
