The rise of Twitter is old news by now. The media, celebrities, and nearly every mover and shaker out there has been seduced by the micro-blogging social networking site. But this week, Twitter has been in the news for something other than Ashton Kutcher’s million followers; the company is reporting that Twitter was hacked on or around the 15th of April by someone using the screen name “Hacker Kroll.”
The attack was said to have originated in France, and the hacker managed to defeat Twitter’s security protocols and access sensitive information in some user accounts, including the account of President Barack Obama. The brazen hacker even went so far as to upload screen shots of himself viewing sensitive details of many of the accounts that were hacked.
But stupidly, some of the screenshots also included the IP address of the last person to access the account (i.e a hacker), meaning that his whereabouts have been traced to a specific region of France, and police may find this information very useful in tracking him down once and for all.
Twitter cofounder Biz Stone finally confirmed that the site had been hacked, but he maintained that no more than 10 accounts were compromised, and that no sensitive information was edited or deleted. He also confirmed that the hacker had broken into the personal e-mail account of a Twitter employee, and from there was able to locate passwords to access the back end of the Twitter system.
But this isn’t the first time the micro-blogging giant has been hacked. In a story that made front-page news last year, the twitter accounts of several celebrities were broken into. Among the celebrities who were hacked were Britney Spears and (once again) Barack Obama.
Now that Twitter has officially become the flavor of the month — or perhaps the flavor of the year, the creeps are coming out of the woodwork to try to tarnish their shiny image. Experts predict we’ll be seeing plenty more hacking attempts on Twitter, and the company has already tightened their internal security to try to minimize any future damage from hackers.
With so many news organizations, celebrities and politicians relying on Twitter to keep their followers abreast of their every move, it becomes critical that the site be made secure. Otherwise, high profile Twitterers like President Obama will be forced to stay away from the site. Politicians especially cannot afford to be associated with a social network that is not 100% secure. The potential downside of getting hacked online is significant indeed, and could potentially pose a national security threat.
