The hacker who hijacked a Twitter admin account in May has been distributing sensitive files taken from the company, ostensibly to educate people about the risks of poor computer security.

Thomas Claburn, Editor at Large, Enterprise Mobility

July 15, 2009

2 Min Read

The hacker who broke into Twitter in May has been distributing the company's confidential documents to various Web sites.

TechCrunch on Tuesday said it had received a compressed file containing 310 documents. Most, said editor Michael Arrington, are mildly embarrassing but are not otherwise noteworthy. A few, however, contain sensitive information such as security passcodes.

Twitter co-founder Evan Williams reportedly has confirmed the authenticity of the documents. Neither Williams nor Twitter responded to requests for comment.

Thomas Landspurg, CTO of Webwag, also said he had been contacted by the hacker, known by the pseudonym "Hacker Croll," and had been given copies of the Twitter documents.

In his blog TomSoft, Landspurg said that Croll claimed to have obtained access to Amazon, Apple, AT&T, Gmail, MobileMe, and Paypal accounts belonging to Williams, his wife Sara Morishige Williams, and Twitter employees Margaret Utgoff and Kevin Thau.

This may explain why Williams on Tuesday evening sent a tweet that said, "Having a bad night."

Landspurg has posted scrubbed screenshots of some of the hacked accounts in support of Croll's claims.

In May, Croll posted a screenshot of Twitter's internal analysis of the worm attack that hit the site in April.

Croll gained access to Twitter two months ago by answering the secret question that allows Twitter users to reset their passwords, the same technique used to obtain access to Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's e-mail account last year.

In an e-mail to Landspurg, Croll reportedly said that he hopes his actions will help people realize that nobody is safe online and that people need to be more careful with their secret questions.

Update: Twitter co-founder Biz Stone has posted additional details about the incident.

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About the Author(s)

Thomas Claburn

Editor at Large, Enterprise Mobility

Thomas Claburn has been writing about business and technology since 1996, for publications such as New Architect, PC Computing, InformationWeek, Salon, Wired, and Ziff Davis Smart Business. Before that, he worked in film and television, having earned a not particularly useful master's degree in film production. He wrote the original treatment for 3DO's Killing Time, a short story that appeared in On Spec, and the screenplay for an independent film called The Hanged Man, which he would later direct. He's the author of a science fiction novel, Reflecting Fires, and a sadly neglected blog, Lot 49. His iPhone game, Blocfall, is available through the iTunes App Store. His wife is a talented jazz singer; he does not sing, which is for the best.

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