Twitter passwords allegedly leaked, all accounts at risk

The LinkedIn hack story was barely history when Mark Zuckerberg’s social media profiles were compromised. And now an alarm has been raised for all Twitter accounts

Hackers across the world seem to be making a mockery of the security systems of social media websites. It took four years to analyse the intensity of the popular LinkedIn hack, and now hackers claim to have access to Twitter user credentials.

The leaked information is reported to contain usernames, email addresses and passwords as plain texts. This comes as a shocker since it implies that the world’s most popular microblogging website never encrypted anything!

According to a Gadget360 report, the hacker claims to have access to 379 million accounts. Since Twitter’s official active user database is 310 million, this means that millions of inactive accounts were also compromised. 

If the claims are true by any chance, that would mean all of Twitter has been hacked.

Amusingly, the hacker has also placed the stolen information on sale for 10 Bitcoins. Bitcoin is a digital asset and payment system. One Bitcoin is approximately equal to $580. So one could buy 310 million passwords for about $6000. 

However, a Twitter spokesperson told Reuters, "We are confident that usernames and credentials were not obtained by a data breach. Our systems have not been breached."