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06 Jan 2009
A new series of attacks on micro-blogging site Twitter has left some celebrities red-faced.
The company admitted in a blog posting that the attacks occurred early on Monday morning and targeted 33 accounts, including several celebrity Twitter feeds.
Among the victims were US president-elect Barack Obama, pop star Britney Spears and news networks CNN and Fox News.
The hacker posted a fictional update to the Twitter feed for CNN anchorman Rick Sanchez which read: 'I am high on crack right now, might not be coming into work today.'
A similar post was made to the Fox News blog claiming that anchorman Bill O'Reilly was gay, while the Spears feed sported a vulgar message claiming to be from the pop singer. Obama's feed included a link to a survey site which pays users for traffic referrals.
Twitter said that as of early afternoon US Pacific time, all of the hacked accounts had been secured and any posts made by the attacker had been removed.
The postings appeared shortly after news broke of a phishing attack on Twitter users. The company said that this latest series of hacks is not believed to be related to the phishing operation.
"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," the company explained.
As a result of the attack, Twitter has taken down the compromised support tools until a fix can be made to prevent future attacks.
Users are still being advised to steer clear of unsolicited messages, and ignore any outside site that asks for Twitter log-in details.
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Obama is on Twitter
Tony, in response to your post, I can testify that Barack Obama is on Twitter - he is one of my contacts. Although he may not be messaging every day, he has a PR group that does it for him. I expect that is who the hacker targeted. I also expect Britney Spears has the same set up. I can testify that the phishing attack has occurred because I was subject to it. I received the direct messages from those I am following and quickly after Twitter changed their passwords. But you do have a point, the attack is good publicity, it just comes at a cost.
Posted by: Rosalie 07 Jan 2009
free advertising
i have never heard of twitter before i read this story i have looked at it and it is the same as facebook but with less on it and less people using it. i find it difficult to beleve that obama or spears have the time with nothing better to do than go on this site, it seems very convinient that because of this story half the world has not only heard of this site but also been told that such celebratys use it and if you start using it you may get a chance to communicate with them. how much would you need to pay for that kind of advertising? i set up an account with them to have a look at the site and was at no point asked for my real name just a user name and e-mail address
Posted by: tony 06 Jan 2009