What do you do when your any of the login details for your social media account gets compromised? The common (and logical) step would be to change your password right away and make it way different than what it was in the first place. Donald Trump, however, could not be bothered by this.
An astonishing revelation around one such password used by Trump for his Twitter account has been made in a new report by Netherlands-based nltimes. As per the report, Trump used the password 'yourfired' for his Twitter account till 2016. The fun part, this password had been leaked already for his LinkedIn account way back in 2012.
The leak was a part of the notorious 2012 LinkedIn data breach that saw a total of 117 million usernames and passwords compromised. As per the report by nltimes, three Dutch hackers found Trump's 'yourfired' password through the breach. All they did next was use it on his Twitter account and it worked.
The three hackers used the password on Trump¡¯s account just before the presidential elections in October 2016. The report clarifies that the hackers did not ¡°mean to do any harm or post anything¡± from Trump's account. The intent was to check for security lapses and report it to the concerned authorities.
Part of the reason for this was the fact that Trump was a presidential candidate at that point. Any cyber attack, even on his personal social media channels, could have been interpreted as a targeted one.
These factors made it even more shocking that Trump was using a misspelled version of his famous catchphrase ¡°you're fired¡± as the password. The catchphrase has been repeated numerous times by Trump on his old reality TV show 'The Apprentice'.
"They were shocked when it worked. The Dutch knew they were potentially in trouble, because it could be interpreted as a cyber attack on a presidential candidate," Vrij Nederland journalist Gerard Janssen, who saw the hacking screenshots, was quoted as saying.?
Once they were able to login, the hackers reported the vulnerability to Trump as well as the United States government. Trump did not respond to their warning. The National Cyber Security Center, however, took a note of it, saying "Thank you for contacting us".
Trump¡¯s personal Twitter account has been responsible for numerous controversies over the years. It is, thus, no surprise that hackers would want to target his account for malpractices. You would think that knowing this, Trump would take his passwords more seriously. But hey, who are we to judge!