Hackers gained access to the Twitter accounts of Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and many others Wednesday afternoon in an apparent cryptocurrency giveaway scam. Other accounts including Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Apple, Uber, and Square’s CashApp were also hacked. Update, 2:45 p.m. PT: Here’s the first statement from Twitter:
We are aware of a security incident impacting accounts on Twitter. We are investigating and taking steps to fix it. We will update everyone shortly.
— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 15, 2020
The tweet below was posted from Gates’ account at 1:34 p.m. PT, but was then deleted. The same tweet from Gates appeared at 1:48 p.m. PT.
“We can confirm that this tweet was not sent by Bill Gates,” a spokesperson for Bill Gates told GeekWire. “This appears to be part of a larger issue that Twitter is facing. Twitter is aware and working to restore the account.”
A tweet from Musk was sent out just before 1:30 p.m. PT and was also deleted, before another appeared at 1:50 p.m. PT. Update: Another similar tweet appeared at 2:19 p.m. PT.
Looks like Elon may have been hacked pic.twitter.com/H3SbSU8NJI
— Mathew Ingram (@mathewi) July 15, 2020
Biden, Obama, and Bezos were also hacked:
Here are the tweets from Apple and Uber’s accounts:
Uber responded with this:
Like many others, our @Uber account was hit by a scammer today. The tweet has been deleted and we’re working directly with @Twitter to figure out what happened.
— Uber Comms (@Uber_Comms) July 15, 2020
More than $100,000 had been funneled to the bitcoin address included in the tweets.
Even those with two-factor authentication reported having their accounts compromised.
Twitter stock was down more than 3% in after-hours trading.
The Verge noted that Musk has been targeted by bitcoin scammers in the past.
Update, 3:18 p.m. PT: Twitter appeared to disable verified accounts as part of its response to the hacking.
Seems verified accounts are currently blocked from tweeting.
— Andrew Mulholland (@itwasntandy) July 15, 2020
You may be unable to Tweet or reset your password while we review and address this incident.
— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 15, 2020
Here is more commentary from others:
UPDATE: @elonmusk, @CashApp and @Ripple also appear to be compromised, among other prominent accounts. CoinDesk has reached out to Twitter for comment. https://t.co/l0q5PwuJ32
— CoinDesk (@CoinDesk) July 15, 2020
ALL MAJOR CRYPTO TWITTER ACCOUNTS HAVE BEEN COMPROMISED.
2FA / strong password was used for @Gemini account. We are investigating and hope to have more information shortly. https://t.co/X3C0uJzc6C
— Cameron Winklevoss (@winklevoss) July 15, 2020
Wow – massive sitewide hack. Search on “doubling all payments” — it’s not just billlionaires spewing this…. https://t.co/9Hj3ofeyI4
— Mark Harris (@meharris) July 15, 2020
Many great security recommendations floating around after the big #twitterhack. But this was an inside job. Great passwords and 2FA wouldn’t help in this case.
— Aaron Pressman (@ampressman) July 15, 2020
I was wrong. This is 100% Twitter hack. No one is safe https://t.co/ISqtOh4ucI
— Larry Cermak (@lawmaster) July 15, 2020
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