Twitter Insider Was Allegedly Responsible For The Biggest Hacking Incident: Report

Several verified high profile users on Twitter Inc TWTR, including such as Elon Musk, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden, sent out tweets promoting a bitcoin scam as a result of an alleged hacking Wednesday, which Twitter claimed was a result of social engineering. 

An Inside Job

According to Vice, which spoke to two individuals who took over the accounts, a company insider may have been involved in the hacking. One of Vice's sources said, "We used a [representative] that literally done all the work for us." Another source claimed that the supposed insider was paid.

Seller of Vanity Accounts Maybe Responsible

A hacker, who goes by the moniker "Kirk," was the likely beneficiary of over $117,000 garnered by compromising the accounts of prominent users. The hacker is known for providing access to vanity Twitter accounts, which are considered valuable and are usually short in length and easy to recognize, TechCrunch noted.

Employees Compromised By Social Engineering

Twitter announced on social media that it was investigating the incident and acknowledged that some of its employees were compromised due to social engineering. 

We detected what we believe to be a coordinated social engineering attack by people who successfully targeted some of our employees with access to internal systems and tools.

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 16, 2020

Hackers Used Internal Tool

The supposed hackers used an internal tool at Twitter to take over the accounts. A screenshot provided to Vice's Motherboard showcased the user account of Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange. Binance was affected in Wednesday's hacking incident. The Vice's tech publication reports that some of the user accounts were taken over by changing the email address associated with them.

Twitter Deleted Leaked Screenshots

Screenshots of the compromised user tool were shared by a hacking community to Vice. Twitter has reportedly been deleting the screenshots of the control panel and has issued suspensions to the users who shared them, stating that they violated its rules.