Prime Minister’s Twitter account could be compromised
Senior members of the UK government aren’t taking enough precautions to secure their Twitter accounts, Buzzfeed reported Monday last week.
Of the 19 who use Twitter, 11 hadn’t set their security to prompt for the user to input their email address or phone number to start the password reset process. This means that anyone who tries to reset the password of someone who hasn’t take precautions is presented with a partially redacted representation of the email address associated with the account.
Buzzfeed quoted Mustafa Al-Bassam, a volunteer at Privacy International, who said: “If hackers can learn the email address that you use for Twitter, then it makes it easier to compromise your Twitter account.” He pointed out that if the email address can be worked out, a hacker could then target it with phishing attacks designed to harvest passwords.
As of last week, Theresa May, the Prime Minister, and Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, still had not secured their Twitter accounts.
Two weeks ago, it was pointed out that US President Donald Trump also hadn’t secured his Twitter account, but when it was checked last Monday the setting had been changed.
It’s not only politicians who risk being compromised: you can check your Twitter account by going to your settings page and under the Security and Privacy tab, making sure you’ve ticked the option that says “Require personal information to reset my password”.
