A group by the name of "Script Kiddies" has claimed responsibility for hacking into USAToday's Twitter account and posting insensitive 9/11 remarks. The group apparantly Tweeted to @nbcnews that ground zero was under threat on the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attack.
USAToday, now under control of its account, has posted an apology, but the damage has already been done. According to Tech Crunch, the group most likely used a spyware Trojan horse, sent by email, which likely captured passwords to the account as they were typed into the computer.
Compared to Facebook, Twitter's security efforts are spartan. Facebook employs authentication mechanisms, alrts, login approvals and can even proactively suspend compromised accounts. Twitter, meanwhile, lacks any of these features. The most the system does is verify accounts, but that does nothing to help prevent hackers from posing as real people.
Script Kiddies, meanwhile, still seems to be alive and kicking – and even still has its own Facebook page.
Trisha Friedman
Wow I never thought I would see the day when scriptkiddy was used with pride!