Twitter's No Good, Very Bad Day

Joe Biden, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Mike Bloomberg get hacked? Nothing to see here...

Jul 16, 2020

Remember: Never underestimate how gullible human beings are.

Hackers took over some of Twitter’s highest profile accounts on Wednesday night and told the public that, if they send them Bitcoin, they’ll double the money they send.

And… lots of people sent money.

Binyamin Appelbaum @BCAppelbaum

I read the first line and thought maybe this year Amazon had decided to pay taxes.

Except it appears the accounts themselves weren’t hacked… instead, hackers seem to have gained access to one of Twitter’s internal, employee-only dashboards. Vice’s Joseph Cox did some criticial initial reporting and has all the gory details.

HuffPost @HuffPost

BREAKING: Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Bill Gates and Apple are among the victims of a seemingly unprecedented — and ongoing — Twitter hack.

huffp.stJoe Biden, Elon Musk, Bill Gates And Others Apparently Hacked In Bitcoin ScamBarack Obama, Jeff Bezos, Kanye West, Michael Bloomberg, Apple and Uber appear to also be targets in the massive cryptocurrency scheme.

Well, at least they only parted the gullible from their money and didn’t take over @realdonaldtrump to spark a war with Canada. I never liked that Michael Moore movie anyway.

More seriously, Thursday is going to be a rough day for both $TWTR stock and Twitter’s corporate comms team. I also expect a flood of negative news regarding Twitter’s security in the next few weeks. Security holes this massive are usually accompanied by many other smaller, but no-less-dangerous vulnerabilities.

Enjoy!

The Big Picture

Office kitchens in the post-COVID workplace are gonna stink.
Lyz Lenz nails the COVID resiliency discourse:
Lyz Lenz @lyzl
The myth of resiliency in Middle America (and I think other parts of America) that if you keep going as if Covid doesn't exists you are stronger and better. When in reality resiliency is having the ability to adjust and assess risk. What you are is just sick with Covid.
3:41 PM ∙ Jul 13, 2020
598Likes86Retweets

Marketing/Advertising/PR

Challenge level: How do you make comic cons 100% virtual but still fun.
Why publisher branded content studios face an uphill climb.
It turns out 100 million+ Americans being stuck at home equals a perfect time to launch junk food brands.
I’m loving Nike’s new augmented reality coloring book.
Diageo’s testing a (publicity stunty! but still cool!) paper Johnnie Walker bottle.
The problems with advertising treating attention like it’s a currency.
While many brands publicly advocated for Black Lives Matter, they rushed to make sure their ads didn’t show up near any George Floyd stories.
Don’t post about your cancer diagnosis on Facebook unless you want to get spammed with quack cancer therapy ads in your newsfeed.

Media

I’m in awe of how data scientist Ammar Alyousfi broke down the data points that propel videos to YouTube’s trending tab.
Why Donald Trump Jr.’s decision to self-publish his next book makes pretty substantial financial and marketing sense in a world where politics overlaps with fandom.
Peacock. It launched! Battlestar Galactica reboot forthcoming.

Tech

The security legacy of the Cult of the Dead Cow.
Tech executive Michael Lofthouse of Solid8, whose racist rant against an Asian family at a California restaurant went viral, resigned from his job.
Spotify is launching in Russia and 12 other (mostly ex-Soviet and Eastern Bloc) countries in one of the largest expansions in the service’s history.

Fun

Meet Florida’s only soccer hooligan.

A genuine thank you for spending time with this newsletter. Likes? Dislikes? Suggestions for future issues? Write me at neal@nealungerleider.com.