Why Twitter Can't Even Protect Tech CEOs From Getting Hacked (buzzfeed.com)

Over the past few weeks, we have seen a number of CEOs -- including Google's Sundar Pichai, and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg -- become victims of Twitter hacks. One must ask, what's wrong with Twitter that so many people -- including high-profile names -- keep getting hacked? BuzzFeed dives deep into the problem, and says it's how Twitter interacts with third-party apps that's at fault. From the article:Over the past several weeks, however, a three-person hacking team called OurMine has made clear that years after the problem first came to light, third-party authentication is still a security nightmare for Twitter. By gaining access to apps with third-party write access, OurMine has been able to post to the Twitter accounts of tech bigwigs like Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and Uber CEO Travis Kalanick. In other words, whichever write-authorized app connected to your Twitter is least secure is exactly how secure your Twitter account is. [...] The public nature of Twitter, whose main point is to share information as quickly and widely as possible, has made these attacks a much bigger issue for Jack Dorsey's company than they are for Facebook. And there's very little Twitter can do to solve the problem that doesn't defeat the incentives for third-party writing privileges in the first place: Speed and functionality. Adding layers of security -- like an extra login -- to access Twitter through a third-party app defeats the purpose of speedy cross-platform sharing. And disabling third-party writing would anger developers and hurt engagement, a cost Twitter probably isn't willing to bear.

Comments

I expect its something like this

[swb]

PR Manager: CEO Bob needs a twitter account. Can you set that up for him?

PR Intern: You got it. OK, here's the account and password.

CEO Bob: Hey, I need to get the twitter account on my phone and tablet.

PR Manager: OK, we can add them.

PR Intern: We need to change the password on CEO Bob's twitter account.

PR Manager: We can't, he's in Davos/Aspen/St. Bart's and he won't know how to log back in.

Hacked CEO Bob on Twitter: I suck! My company is a fraud!

How to not "get hacked" on Twitter, 3 easy steps

[Cajun Hell]

1) Think about why you post to Twitter. (Are you reaching anyone? If there actually is someone, is this the only way you can reach them? Is this an easy or convenient way to communicate? Does it help you express your ideas?)

2) Draw a total blank. Stare into space a while. Make sure. (Hmm.. nope, still nothing.)

3) Delete account.

Twitter is one of the dumbest and least-useful ideas ever. Even Facebook is a good idea, a model of interactivity and convenient expression and dialog, compared to Twitter.

"A little more equal"

[hyades1]

There's an in-built assumption here that goes to the heart of the whole privacy debate: that people like Zuckerberg and Pichai deserve a higher standard of protection than the rest of us from having their private information accessed by people who may not have their best interests at heart.

Including high-profile names?

[fahrbot-bot]

Over the past few weeks, we have seen a number of CEOs -- including Google's Sundar Pichai, and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg -- become victims of Twitter hacks. One must ask, what's wrong with Twitter that so many people -- including high-profile names -- keep getting hacked?

What does a person's status have anything to do with the ability for his/her Twitter account getting hacked? Passwords and/or protocols are either weak or not and don't play favorites based on a person's status.