Twitter was hacked on Tuesday, and the hacker who goes by the name “Mauritania Attacker” released the account information for thousands of users.
According to Social News Daily, the hacker leaked details for 15,167 accounts including “ Twitter IDs, handles, oauth_token, and oauth_token secret codes.”
The leaked information can be used to log into a users account and post information without their approval.
A plain text version of user account information was made available via Zippyshare.
While passwords were not leaked, the hacker did show their ability to access a large amount of information via the social networks database.
Running the right script with the information available could allow hackers to gain limited access to a Twitter users account.
According to Techworm, the hacker claims to have full access to the “entire database of users on Twitter.” The hacker has also threatened to release “unlimited accounts credentials in the coming future.”
PROTECTING YOUR ACCOUNT
If you want to be proactive with your Twitter account, you can start by heading over to your apps settings inside your Twitter account and removing any Apps that take advantage of your account. Twitter OAuth tokens do not currently expire, which means users must manually revoke them.
When you go to log into an account that requires Twitter authentication, you can once against approve that app.
If you run OAuth tokens via your own website accounts, the best option may be to take advantage of Twitter’s two factor authentication.
Mauritania Attacker runs the AnonGhost collective and calls himself a “non-extremist” hacker. He doesn’t appear to have ties with the Syrian Electronic Army, but he has not confirmed his involvement with the hacktivist group Anonymous.
Are you worried about Twitter being hacked and your account information being stolen by hackers?