Last Night’s Huge Twitter Hack
There’s been a stunning breach of security at Twitter, a cybercriminal cartel taking over the social media platform on an unprecedented scale. This is Twitter’s highest-profile hack ever. Everyone’s watching.
Twitter scrambled to block verified accounts with more than 200,000 followers from tweeting because, in truth, the site had no idea how to defend itself other than to hit the kill switch.
The blue check accounts were back ten minutes later, but the ordeal left a scene of confusion in its wake. It’s now a hunt for the hackers, their motives, and their accomplices.
There’s smoking-gun evidence that points to Bitcoin scam artists, surprise, surprise. The site’s most prominent accounts, belonging to Kanye, Obama, Bezos, Apple, Uber, and Musk, were all posting strange links to the same web address. But this has got to be a decoy.
You could retire on the gains made from shorting Twitter right before the breach, even if it happened after-hours. You could make mint silencing someone on behalf of a government, but who and why?
The President’s account was too dangerous to mess with, but investors across the social sphere still need to know this wasn’t a hacker’s rehearsal for election meddling in November. Facebook’s stock fell almost 40% in 2016 on that very type of scandal, and think if the suspects get pinned down in China or Russia. That would only fuel geopolitical tensions.
The price of Bitcoin could, and perhaps should, be buried. The leading cryptocurrency is never going to escape the grey market and find institutional support at this rate. Its decentralized nature allows criminals to operate in secret and run scams just like this one.
The hackers are in for Silicon Valley jobs as soon as they graduate from prison, assuming they’ve not already made enough money. What have they pickpocketed from Twitter financially? That’s also a matter for the Invstr community!
I am not a financial advisor and my comments should never be taken as financial advice. Investments come with risk, so always do your research and analysis beforehand.