Following the recent hijacking of multiple high-profile Twitter accounts, users on the platform have begun to analyze the cyber attack and the effects it may have on the platform’s future.
Twitter recently faced a major security breach as the accounts of multiple high-profile individuals and companies were hijacked, including Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, Former President Barack Obama, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Microsoft founder Bill Gates, and the official accounts of ride-sharing service Uber and tech giant Apple.
Now, many individuals from multiple fields are reacting to the news that major accounts were apparently easily hijacked in the space of a few hours, and how the platform could prevent such an attack again in the future.
Motherboard reporter Jason Koebler tweeted that photos of internal Twitter tools shared with Motherboard by sources claiming to have knowledge of the hack are being removed from Twitter for containing “personal information,” despite the screenshots simply showing an internal Twitter dashboard with no identifying info.
Earlier, Twitter told us that it was only locking accounts that posted private personal information. The screenshot I tweeted has no personal information in it and was censored, it just shows how an internal Twitter tool pic.twitter.com/7hHxCzhtUL
— Jason Koebler (@jason_koebler) July 16, 2020
Many across Twitter have begun to worry about the impact of the hack, game developer Mark Kern best known for working as a team lead on the popular game World of Warcraft tweeted that the hack could have “some really, really, big impacts.”
The more I think about this, the worse this Twitter hack is on multiple fronts.
It's going to have some really, really, big impacts.
— Grummz (@Grummz) July 16, 2020
Journalist and eSports commentator Richard Lewis claimed in a twee that the leaked internal tools prove that the company lied to Congress about the types of tools they had in place, this likely refers to what appears to be “blacklisting” options for accounts in Twitter’s internal tools. Dorsey and his staff have long claimed that the act of “shadowbanning” or preventing users’ tweets from being seen is a conspiracy theory.
This Twitter hack stuff is amazing. Not only does it prove how weak their security is, it also proves they lied about the types of tools they had in place when they were questioned by congress. They're suspending accounts over sharing this btw. https://t.co/tfBqKfV166
— Richard Lewis (@RLewisReports) July 16, 2020
Journalist Tim Pool came to a similar conclusion, stating that blacklisting options are clearly labeled in the leaked internal screenshots:
I don't get why anyone bothers arguing about social media bias against conservatives, its a fact
Twitter's best response to me last year was "thank you for the feedback"
Now we can see in the leaked screenshots they seemingly do shadowban and black list people
— Tim Pool (@Timcast) July 16, 2020
Kim Dotcom, the German-Finnish Internet entrepreneur and founder of the file-sharing website Megaupload.com who is fighting 2012 charges of copyright infringement and money laundering related to the site, commented that the hack has revealed that evidence from social media is no longer reliable in Court as it can be edited by Twitter employees or anyone with access to Twitter’s internal tools.
What does the @twitter hack reveal?
There are govt backdoors with god mode (full editing power for every account and every message).
Evidence from email, smart phones, social media is no longer reliable in Court because it can be edited.
Backdoors can be abused, as seen today.
— Kim Dotcom (@KimDotcom) July 16, 2020
The account of the cryptocurrency wallet MyCrypto posted a number of tweets outlining when certain accounts posted tweets containing links to Bitcoin donation scams and the Bitcoin addresses linked to the scam.
Seriously taking a break. pic.twitter.com/uBDHLKVCf2
— beta.mycrypto.com (@MyCrypto) July 16, 2020
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey tweeted that it was a “tough day” at the company following the events of the hack:
Tough day for us at Twitter. We all feel terrible this happened.
We’re diagnosing and will share everything we can when we have a more complete understanding of exactly what happened.
💙 to our teammates working hard to make this right.
— jack (@jack) July 16, 2020
Many made light of the situation including British television host Piers Morgan who tweeted that he would not be tweeting “Bitcoin advice”:
UPDATE: No, I’m not Ghislaine Maxwell’s secret husband, nor am I transitioning, providing Bitcoin advice, quitting GMB, going vegan or replacing Jofra Archer in the Test match.
All will be revealed at high noon.— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) July 16, 2020
Breitbart News will continue to follow this story and update readers on the latest events as more information comes to light.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com
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