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Twitter hack: What happened?

Published on: 20 Jul 2020

Potentially thousands of people were scammed out of money after accounts of prominent verified users were hijacked. Messages were sent out that promised to double the money fans sent them in the cryptocurrency Bitcoin.

Using Twitter's internal systems, the cyber-criminals' messages had a reach of at least 350 million people.

And it looks like it made them about $110,000 (£86,800) in the few hours that the scam was active.

There’s no denying that the attack was huge but experts say hackers could have caused far more damage.

It is the platform of choice for some of the most powerful and prominent people in the world.

Their posts have moved financial markets and caused diplomatic incidents.

With the US presidential election less than four months away, there are now valid questions to be asked about whether Twitter can be relied upon in the lead up to the vote.