Twitter CEO's account sent racial slurs to followers for 20 minutes

You’d think the social media head of one of the largest social media firms would have better control of his account, but Jack Dorsey’s account was compromised earlier today. The account began posting racial slurs and other Nazi propaganda earlier this evening and was later shut down when discovered.

https://twitter.com/TwitterComms/status/1167528672523210752

https://twitter.com/TwitterComms/status/1167548246618587137

The issue appeared to be a third-party app, one of the most common means of breaching Twitter accounts. Let’s say one uses a third-party service or app to push tweets to Twitter. You’ve already authorised the app to send tweets to your account, so even if your account is secure, it’s only as snug as its weakest link.
In this case, the rust in the chain appeared to be ClouddHopper, an SMS based app that Twitter owns and purchased earlier in 2010. In this case, Twitter did not confirm that but did state that none of its systems were compromised. As the offending tweets were sent via Cloud Hopper, that seems a safe assumption.

Not just to for Mr Dorsey and other high profile Twitter accounts, it is generally advised for users to regularly audit the apps which have access to their social media. It’s no good setting up a secure lock but handing over the backdoor key to shady people.