Major Twitter Breach Uses Social Engineering to Hijack High-Profile Accounts
A massive cryptocurrency scam compromises prominent verified accounts on Twitter through a coordinated social engineering attack on internal employees. The breach exposes significant security flaws within the social network.
A major security breach on Twitter compromises several high-profile accounts to promote a cryptocurrency scam. Hackers simultaneously take over verified profiles belonging to prominent figures like Barack Obama, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates to post fraudulent messages promising to double any Bitcoin sent to a specific address.
Twitter investigates the incident as a coordinated social engineering attack that targets employees with access to internal systems and tools. By compromising these internal staff members, the hackers gain the ability to seize control of highly visible accounts and post on their behalf without needing to bypass individual user passwords.
The social network responds by removing the fraudulent tweets and temporarily locking all verified accounts from posting. While the attackers successfully obtain around £93,000 in Bitcoin through the scam, the incident primarily exposes a significant systemic security flaw that affects the entire platform and raises concerns about overall user safety.