Twitter becomes the third social network to warn users of state-sponsored attacks, after Google and Facebook
From hacking by individuals to state sponsored cyber attacks, we have come a long way in cyber security. In fact, state sponsored cyber attacks are fast outpacing the traditional cyber criminals in today’s world. Facebook and Google have already started warning their users about nation sponsored cyber attacks and now Twitter became the third tech company to follow suit.
Yesterday, a few Twitter users tweeted out an email they got from the social network’s security staff, in which they were warned of cyber-attacks on their account from what the team suspected to be a state-sponsored group.
Twitter has been subject of hack attacks from such state sponsored entities because it hosts accounts of thousands of journalists, political dissidents and other opponents. As said above, until now, Google and more recently Facebook have been the only two companies that have warned users of possible state-sponsored attacks.
Twitter said it was investigating the attack but did not provide details of the origin. Yesterday we listed the state sponsored hacking groups and we know for sure that only China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and the US employ such groups on a larger scale but it is also known that smaller countries also sponsor such hacking groups. These are usually the ones with an oppressive government, such as some Middle Eastern, African, and South American regimes.
Most of the people targeted by the attack are known activists and security researchers, and most are living in western countries.
Just received this email from Twitter suggesting my account may have been targeted by state-sponsored actors. pic.twitter.com/QLcCzsHphw
— Runa Sandvik (@runasand) December 11, 2015
In its message, Twitter recommended users to stay safe by using Tor for most of their online activities, but also consulting the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s “Protecting Yourself on Social Networks” guidelines.
We received a warning from @twitter today stating we may be "targeted by state-sponsored actors" pic.twitter.com/oZm83eVFC5
— coldhak (@coldhakca) December 11, 2015
