Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack? • Hacker News Board

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#31

Post by liquidise » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:05 PM UTC

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #11

man who falls for this stuff. i've been seeing "send me money to this account to get double that" scam for like 20 years, its hard to believe there are people who still don't know better.

Consider this: i'd argue that the fundamental feature of twitter isn't tweets. It is the underlying certainty that the tweeted content belongs to the person with the blue checkmark.

My friends in social media positions heard about the twitter hack from me, not the other way around. Given how this info disseminated, combined with the breaking of twitters fundamental feature, i'm surprised more people didn't fall for the scam. A commenter yesterday claimed Coinbase had blacklisted the wallet very early on. I assume Gemini and Binance had similar reactions. Without this swift action, i'd wager the actual haul could have been many times the ~13 BTC they ended up with.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#32

Post by syshum » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:06 PM UTC

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #11

man who falls for this stuff. i've been seeing "send me money to this account to get double that" scam for like 20 years, its hard to believe there are people who still don't know better.

Hello, I am a Nigerian Prince and I need your help....

//That scam still works today, never underestimate the gullibility of people.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#33

Post by phire » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:06 PM UTC

sillysaurusx wrote: post #2

While it may sound ridiculous that anyone would be fooled into sending bitcoin in response to these tweets, an analysis of the BTC wallet promoted by many of the hacked Twitter profiles shows that on July 15 the account processed 383 transactions and received almost 13 bitcoin on July 15 — or approximately USD $117,000. This could be mostly the attackers’ own money. It’s impossible to tell, but I haven’t seen anyone…

Maybe the first transaction or two.

But a lot of those transactions will be from people who enjoyed the hack and want to reward the hacker for their work.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#34

Post by dilandau » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:07 PM UTC

TechBro8615 wrote: post #23

This is the most important point: > Also, it seems clear that this Twitter hack could have let the attackers view the direct messages of anyone on Twitter, information that is difficult to put a price on but which nevertheless would be of great interest to a variety of parties, from nation states to corporate spies and blackmailers. My understanding is the hackers used the admin panel to change the email addresses of…

I'm curious about this, too. I have to believe, though, that if some bumbling sim swappers were able to get in, then it doesn't require a leap to assume sophisticated state-level actors have similar access. Granted this attack leaves a swath of evidence, but with access to internal tooling, it really is just a factor of how much information is accessible via those tools (and others like them).

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#35

Post by paulpauper » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:07 PM UTC

hkchad wrote: post #25

chrisseaton wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are these YouTube scams you're referring to? I'm not aware of them.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/fake-spacex-youtube-channels-... The first one I saw was a Rip of a SpaceX livestream. I watched it for a bit then noticed all the BitCoin references and got confused then realized it was a scam account. How they get promoted basically to the front page is the issue.

A solution as simple as just hiring someone for $10/hour to periodically scan youtube for crypto keywords and disable the scam videos and accounts would have prevented millions of dollars of theft.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#36

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:08 PM UTC

paulpauper wrote: post #7

The among taken in this scam is chump change compared to the YouTube scammers. YouTube is a vastly bigger website than twitter and way slower to respond to accounts begin stolen by scammers. I remember seeing an Ripple giveaway scam that in a single day made 100k with just a single account ,. And fake bill gates one made 40k. the list goes on and on. My guess is the total taken is in the $3-5 million range from youtu…

[deleted]

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#37

Post by danso » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:09 PM UTC

> “This is NOT a method, you will be given a full refund if for any reason you aren’t given the email/@, however if it is revered/suspended I will not be held accountable,” Chaewon wrote in their sales thread, which was titled “Pulling email for any Twitter/Taking Requests.”

If access were being sold via message board, I wonder if the thread contains stipulations on which accounts are off-limits for being hacked. My theory to why we didn't see any active government officials accounts get pranked is because the hackers, no matter how confident they were about covering their tracks, still might have worried that such a breach would almost guarantee FBI/NSA-level involvement.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#38

Post by sp332 » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:09 PM UTC

teknopurge wrote: post #4

It's not a hack when an employee holds the door open and gives use of an admin management tool to a third party. Likewise, it's not a bitcoin scam when bitcoin is the method of transfer, just like it's not a US-dollar scam every other time dollars are used in theft.

It's not real hacking unless it's chopping with an ax.

I think simple account takeovers started being called "hacks" jokingly on Facebook, when a friend would find your phone or computer unlocked and logged in.

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#39

Post by runawaybottle » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:10 PM UTC

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #11

man who falls for this stuff. i've been seeing "send me money to this account to get double that" scam for like 20 years, its hard to believe there are people who still don't know better.

It’s got to be teens that fall for it. I can’t imagine the elderly (the demographic that usually fall for this scam) managing a bitcoin transfer.

‘Mom can I please buy $50 worth of bitcoin, pretty please?’

Re: Who’s behind Wednesday’s epic Twitter hack?

#40

Post by txcwpalpha » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 11:10 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #18

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #11

man who falls for this stuff. i've been seeing "send me money to this account to get double that" scam for like 20 years, its hard to believe there are people who still don't know better.

I too don't understand who's technical enough to know what BitCoin is but not technical enough to understand the scam. I think some people are possibly just sending the scammers some money for the banter? A sign of respect for the hack.

Bitcoin isn't just for "technical" people anymore. The 2017 craze caused a ton of non-techies to hear about Bitcoin and get involved. It was front page CNN a decent amount. Coinbase made it their mission to make Bitcoin as accessible as just downloading an app and giving it your credit card info, and IIRC at one point Coinbase was the most downloaded app on the App Store.

There's an argument to be made that the only reason Bitcoin became popular the last few years is because of the amount of non-techies who have been falling for all the same, tired "join my ICO and get rich!" scams.