Twitter said that hackers have entered their internal systems to hijack some of the leading voices on the platform, including American presidential candidate Joe Biden, reality TV star Kim Kardashian, former US President Barack Obama and billionaire Elon Musk and used them to request a digital currency.
Twitter said that employees who have access to their internal systems have been successfully targeted by hackers "who have used this access to control many highly visible accounts (including verified accounts) and tweet on their behalf."
The company said: "We are investigating other malicious activities that they may have participated in or the information they have accessed and we will share more here when we get it."
Twitter has temporarily taken an exceptional step to prevent at least several verified accounts from fully posting messages. He said that he would only restore access when he was sure he could do it safely.
Publicly available blockchain records show that clear fraudsters received more than $ 100,000 (about 75,22,200 rupees) in cryptocurrencies.
CEO Jacques Dorsey previously said the company was diagnosing the problem and promised to share "as much as we can when we have a more complete understanding of what exactly happened".
He said in a tweet on Twitter: "It was a difficult day for us on Twitter. We are all terrified of this happening."
Security breach
Shares of the social media company fell about 5 percent in trading after the market closed before reducing its losses.
In the hours after the initial breach, it appeared that some of the most important users of the platform had difficulties re-controlling their accounts. In the case of Tesla Elon Musk CEO billionaire, for example, a tweet asking for cryptocurrency was removed, and later, another, then third, was popped up.
Other notable affected accounts include: rapper Kanye West, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, investor Warren Buffett, co-founder of Microsoft Bill Gates, and Uber and Apple corporate accounts. Many organizations' accounts focusing on the cryptocurrency have been hijacked.
In total, the affected accounts had tens of millions of users.
Biden's campaign was "in touch" with Twitter, according to someone familiar with the matter. The person said that the company closed the Democrat's account "immediately after the violation and removed a related tweet." Tesla and other affected firms were not immediately available for comment.
Several experts said that the incident raised questions about cybersecurity on Twitter.
"It is clear that the company is not doing enough to protect itself," said Oren Falkwitz, the former chief security officer of Zone 1 Security.
Alberovic, who now heads the Silverado policy accelerator, said that somehow, the public has evaded bullets so far.
"We are fortunate that given the ability to send tweets from the accounts of many famous people, the only thing hackers have done is defraud about $ 110,000 (about 82,75,800 rupees) in bitcoins for about 300 people," he said.
Read More: This Revelation About The 8 Of Diamonds Card Has Twitter Shocked And Confused
Twitter said that employees who have access to their internal systems have been successfully targeted by hackers "who have used this access to control many highly visible accounts (including verified accounts) and tweet on their behalf."
The company said: "We are investigating other malicious activities that they may have participated in or the information they have accessed and we will share more here when we get it."
Twitter has temporarily taken an exceptional step to prevent at least several verified accounts from fully posting messages. He said that he would only restore access when he was sure he could do it safely.
Publicly available blockchain records show that clear fraudsters received more than $ 100,000 (about 75,22,200 rupees) in cryptocurrencies.
CEO Jacques Dorsey previously said the company was diagnosing the problem and promised to share "as much as we can when we have a more complete understanding of what exactly happened".
He said in a tweet on Twitter: "It was a difficult day for us on Twitter. We are all terrified of this happening."
Security breach
Shares of the social media company fell about 5 percent in trading after the market closed before reducing its losses.
In the hours after the initial breach, it appeared that some of the most important users of the platform had difficulties re-controlling their accounts. In the case of Tesla Elon Musk CEO billionaire, for example, a tweet asking for cryptocurrency was removed, and later, another, then third, was popped up.
Other notable affected accounts include: rapper Kanye West, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, investor Warren Buffett, co-founder of Microsoft Bill Gates, and Uber and Apple corporate accounts. Many organizations' accounts focusing on the cryptocurrency have been hijacked.
In total, the affected accounts had tens of millions of users.
Biden's campaign was "in touch" with Twitter, according to someone familiar with the matter. The person said that the company closed the Democrat's account "immediately after the violation and removed a related tweet." Tesla and other affected firms were not immediately available for comment.
Several experts said that the incident raised questions about cybersecurity on Twitter.
"It is clear that the company is not doing enough to protect itself," said Oren Falkwitz, the former chief security officer of Zone 1 Security.
Alberovic, who now heads the Silverado policy accelerator, said that somehow, the public has evaded bullets so far.
"We are fortunate that given the ability to send tweets from the accounts of many famous people, the only thing hackers have done is defraud about $ 110,000 (about 82,75,800 rupees) in bitcoins for about 300 people," he said.
Read More: This Revelation About The 8 Of Diamonds Card Has Twitter Shocked And Confused