Over 2,500 Twitter accounts , including those accounts that have a large number of followers like famous celebrities , have been hacked. Moreover the hacked accounts appear to have been replaced by pornbots that went on to tweet sexual content and post links to adult dating websites. All these hacking attacks have said to be happened within a span of two weeks.
All links posted on the hacked profiles are shortened URL’s mainly Bit.ly. If any curious users investigating the hacked account click the link and sign up for one of those services, the hacker earns a small sum for each of them. This amount generally varies between $1 and $5 depending on the referral network.
The hackers also altered user’s profile pictures, full names and other details in efforts to promote adult sites. The profile picture was noted to have often being changed to that of a woman typically in a suggestive pose or wearing lingerie/swimwear.
The hackers have also managed to compromise even verified accounts belonging to celebrities, such as electrofunk band Chromeo, a The Telegraph reporter, stand-up comedian Azeem Banatwala, Houston Texans wide receiver Cecil Shorts III, and the late New York Times reporter David Carr.
It was also noted that most of the accounts that were hacked were old (the oldest of which was registered in 2007) and some of the accounts also appeared to be dormant, with no new tweets posted in years. It is suggested that if u have a twitter account make sure you have a strong password by using a password manager to generate a strong and secure password to avoid such hacks.
