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Historic Twitter hack: private messages stolen from "Dutch Donald Trump" and 35 high-profile accounts

2020-07-23T17:26:50.792Z


The company confirmed this. The DMs of Bill Gates, Barack Obama, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, at the center of the controversy.


07/23/2020 - 12:54

  • Clarín.com
  • Technology

Twitter reported that in the hack on its platform on July 15, hackers accessed the private messages of 36 of the 130 affected accounts, including that of the Netherlands politician Geert Wilders, leader of the party for Freedom and which many call the " Dutch Donald Trump ".

The internal investigation revealed this Thursday that in the case of hacked accounts, hackers came to access the inbox of private messages, as reported on the support page in their official profile on the social network.

Although it does not specify the name, the company includes in those 36 accounts that of a Dutch politician, and clarifies that "there are no indications that they have accessed the private messages of any other previous or current politician . "

For this clarification, high impact DMs worldwide such as those of Bill Gates, Barack Obama, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos were at the center of the controversy. 

A tweet from the Dutch Trump

"I will become the Prime Minister of the Netherlands," wrote Geert Wilders. Their DMs were hacked.

Ik zal from premier van Nederland worden. # Wilders pic.twitter.com/PFnT9q2W5K

- Geert Wilders (@geertwilderspvv) July 20, 2020

On July 15, the social platform suffered a computer attack to distribute a cryptocurrency scam whereby verified accounts of personalities that are considered "high profile" accounts. 

Last week, it acknowledged that hackers accessed data from eight of the accounts involved in this attack, which were not verified.

Specifically, he explained that through the tool that allows the account details to be downloaded, they accessed information about it, such as activity.

Who is Geert Wilders, the Dutch "Trump"

Wilders, among the DMs that hackers read. (DPA)

Dutch politician Geert Wilders was often compared to Donald Trump . His extreme right-wing ideas have put him at the center of the European political scene.

Founder and leader of the Freedom Party (PVV), he was born in Venlo, an industrial city in the south of the Netherlands. Is 53 years old.

Its main slogans are very controversial. And they are all for the refusal: not to Islam, not to the mosques and Islamic schools in Holland, not to the Koran, which he equates with Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf ("My fight") , not to immigration from countries Muslims, not the veil and the burqa, not the European Union and the euro.

However, although compared to Donald Trump, there is a substantial difference: Geert Wilders has been in politics for 20 years. He does not come from the business world like Trump.

His first public office was held in 1997 as a councilor for Utrecht and in 2002 he officially entered the Dutch parliament. He always had a hate speech against Islam.

Interestingly, in one of the most open and pro-rights nations in Europe, the Netherlands.

36 accounts affected

Bezos' tweet with the hacking information. (Twitter)

In various tweets and an update to his blog post about the "security incident," Twitter said that "up to 36 of the 130 specific accounts, the attackers accessed the DM inbox." And that they are "actively working to communicate directly" with the affected accounts.

He wrote Twitter: " We believe that 36 of the 130 targeted accounts, the attackers accessed the DM including 1 elected politician in the Netherlands. To date, we have no indication of another former or current official who has had their private messages compromised " .

We believe that for up to 36 of the 130 targeted accounts, the attackers accessed the DM inbox, including 1 elected official in the Netherlands. To date, we have no indication that any other former or current elected official had their DMs accessed.

- Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 22, 2020

Twitter declined to say immediately after the attack if the hackers had accessed DMs, which was the question everyone asked.

It turns out that Twitter's messaging system is not well encrypted, but it was never clear whether the administrative tool used by attackers offered access to users' inboxes.

What they could confirm is that 36 accounts were compromised, but they still do not know if the remaining 94 accounts over which they took possession were attacked in direct messages or not.

Although Twitter previously said that "there is no evidence" that hackers have accessed the passwords.

The historic hack

Twitter recognized the security problem. (DPA)

Millionaire entrepreneurs Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates suffered the hacking of their Twitter accounts on July 15, which were used to mount a financial scam in Bitcoins .

Also the Democratic presidential candidate, Joe Biden, who will face Donald Trump in the North American elections, was the object of the massive attack, along with that of former President Barack Obama, companies such as Uber and others related to cryptocurrency.

In the verified profiles of the founder of Microsoft and the owner of Tesla, among others, a scam was mounted whose modality to deceive his followers was identical: they offered them a 100% profit for each one who participated.

Last week, The New York Times verified that four people were connected to the hack by matching their social media and cryptocurrency accounts to the accounts involved with Wednesday's events.

They also presented evidence of their participation, such as logs of their conversations on Discord , a popular messaging platform among gamers and hackers, in addition to Twitter.

PJB

Source: clarin

All tech articles on 2020-07-23

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