{"id":6982,"date":"2017-03-15T06:30:48","date_gmt":"2017-03-15T14:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2017\/03\/15\/news-773\/"},"modified":"2017-03-15T06:30:48","modified_gmt":"2017-03-15T14:30:48","slug":"news-773","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2017\/03\/15\/news-773\/","title":{"rendered":"Twitter Counter hacked: Hundreds of high-profile Twitter accounts hijacked"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Credit to Author: Darlene Storm| Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2017 06:16:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

Twitter seemed to temporarily be overtaken by tweets featuring swastikas, Turkish flags and Nazi references after third-party analytics app Twitter Counter<\/a> was hacked.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear how many Twitter accounts were affected \u2013 hundreds or thousands \u2013 considering Twitter Counter claims to have more than two million users who linked their Twitter accounts to its service for the purpose of providing statistics and tracking responses to tweets.<\/p>\n

Infosec journalist Graham Cluley<\/a> apologized \u201cfor the Nazi spam\u201d after his account was hijacked. There was a rush of people scrubbing their accounts as Amnesty International<\/a>, Duke University<\/a>, Forbes<\/a>, Reuters Japan, BBC North America<\/a>, UNICEF USA, the UK Department of Health, the CEO of Sprint<\/a>, bitcoin wallet Blockchain<\/a>, the Atlanta Police Department, Starbucks Argentina<\/a>, the European Parliament, Nike Spain<\/a>, sports stars, celebrities and many others were compromised and also spewed Nazi spam.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re aware that our service was hacked and have started an investigation into the matter. We’ve already taken measures to contain such abuse,\u201d Twitter Counter tweeted<\/a>. \u201cAssuming this abuse is indeed done using our system, we\u2019ve blocked all ability to post tweets and changed our Twitter app key,\u201d it added<\/a>.<\/p>\n

An hour later, the company tweeted<\/a>, \u201cThe Twitter Counter application is blocked on Twitter. If this activity continues, then we strongly believe it’s not just through us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Twitter Counter attempted to reassure users, saying<\/a> that it does not store Twitter account credentials or credit card information, Twitter also issued a statement, confirming that it had removed permissions for the third-party app and advised users to follow Twitter security tips<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This was not the first time Twitter Counter was hacked<\/a>; in November 2016, the hack resulted<\/a> in Twitter accounts belonging to \u201c@PlayStation, @Viacom, @XboxSupport, @NTSB, @TheNewYorker, @TheNextWeb, the Red Cross (@ICRC) and @Money\u201d aggressively tweeting \u201cways to help you obtain more followers for free.\u201d At the time, the company promised<\/a>, \u201cAs of now, the hackers CANNOT post on our users’ behalf anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Twitter Counter CEO Omer Ginor told<\/a> Bloomberg that the company had a \u201c95 percent certainty\u201d that it had fixed the problem after the November hack. But after the latest hack, it was unsure if \u201ca hacker was \u2018still lurking in the shadows, just waiting for the opportunity\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ginor told<\/a> Reuters, \u201cBoth attacks (had) similar effects and seemingly (the) same country of origin, as the November attackers were indeed operating from Turkey and the actions taken were benefiting Turkish properties and people.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tweets, according to Bloomberg,\u201d included a swastika and described the attack as a \u2018little Ottoman slap.\u2019 \u2018See you on April 16,\u2019 they read, referring to the date of Turkey\u2019s referendum to grant more powers\u201d to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, \u201cand finish with: \u2018What did I write? Learn Turkish.\u2019 A four-minute video attached to the tweets begins with an Erdogan speech in which he says: \u2018If we\u2019re going to die, let\u2019s die like men.\u2019 It then features scenes from various Erdogan speeches.\u201d<\/p>\n

FireEye senior intelligence analyst Jens Monrad said<\/a>, \u201cOn the 11th of March, shortly after the Dutch authorities prevented [Turkish] foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu from flying to Rotterdam, we observed disruption attacks carried out against Rotterdam The Hauge Airport’s website. The DDoS attack was most likely carried out by a Turkish hacktivist group that appears to be motivated by Turkish nationalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the Twitter Counter hack, Michael Patterson, CEO of Plixer International<\/a> said, \u201cGiven the political nature of the tweets, it\u2019s not unreasonable to assume this was a state sponsored hack. The message delivered through this hack has received global attention that would likely not have been possible through any other method. This massive exposure becomes an incentive for others to use cyber-attacks as a means of gaining global attention to their cause.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis highlights the expanded threat surface created when third party applications are granted access to social media platforms and the applications we use every day,\u201d Patterson added. \u201cIt is common for consumer applications to request access to social media platforms, and most people will allow that access. Every time you link another application to your social media platforms, you are providing hackers with another possible point of entry.\u201d<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.computerworld.com\/category\/security\/index.rss<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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Credit to Author: Darlene Storm| Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2017 06:16:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
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Twitter seemed to temporarily be overtaken by tweets featuring swastikas, Turkish flags and Nazi references after third-party analytics app Twitter Counter<\/a> was hacked.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear how many Twitter accounts were affected \u2013 hundreds or thousands \u2013 considering Twitter Counter claims to have more than two million users who linked their Twitter accounts to its service for the purpose of providing statistics and tracking responses to tweets.<\/p>\n

Infosec journalist Graham Cluley<\/a> apologized \u201cfor the Nazi spam\u201d after his account was hijacked. There was a rush of people scrubbing their accounts as Amnesty International<\/a>, Duke University<\/a>, Forbes<\/a>, Reuters Japan, BBC North America<\/a>, UNICEF USA, the UK Department of Health, the CEO of Sprint<\/a>, bitcoin wallet Blockchain<\/a>, the Atlanta Police Department, Starbucks Argentina<\/a>, the European Parliament, Nike Spain<\/a>, sports stars, celebrities and many others were compromised and also spewed Nazi spam.<\/p>\n

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[11062,10643],"tags":[4314,714,1932],"class_list":["post-6982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computerworld","category-independent","tag-internet","tag-security","tag-social-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6982\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}