A Twitter hack earlier this week underscored an unnerving truth: Even the accounts of some of America’s most high-profile politicians aren’t secure.
On Wednesday, a tweet from the account of Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, offered to double the amount of Bitcoin sent to a particular address. Biden was “giving back to the community” through the cryptocurrency, the tweet said. Similar tweets were sent from the accounts of former President Barack Obama and ex-New York City mayor and onetime presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg. The account of rapper Kanye West, who has flirted with the idea of running for president, also made the offer.
Politicians weren’t the only targets in what turned into a long afternoon for Twitter as it melted down under the attack. The accounts of Apple, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Microsoft founder Bill Gates were also hijacked. The attack was widespread and caught Twitter flat-footed. The hackers showed that bypassing security measures wasn’t hypothetical. They’d done it and were in control of the voices of people who can sway opinion during the presidential election season.
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Source: Twitter hack hits Elon Musk, Obama, Kanye West, Bill Gates and more in Bitcoin scam