The official Twitter accounts of Apple, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Kanye West and others were hijacked on Wednesday by scammers trying to dupe people into sending cryptocurrency bitcoin in the hope of doubling their money.
Joe Biden, US democratic presidential aspirant; Kanye West, US rapper; Apple; and Uber, are among the victims of suspected bitcoin hackers.
Others include Barack Obama, former US president; and Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City.
The scam was done in a series of coordinated tweets with emphasis on “giving back” through doubling of bitcoins amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Twitter posts, which have been deleted, were fired off from an array of high-profile accounts telling people they had 30 minutes to send $1,000 in bitcoin in order to be sent back twice as much.
“This is a SCAM, DO NOT participate!” Gemini cryptocurrency exchange co-founder Cameron Winklevoss warned in a tweet from his official account at Twitter.
“This is the same attack/takeover that other major crypto twitter accounts are experiencing. Be vigilant!”
Comments and posts at Twitter indicated thousands of dollars in bitcoin may have been sent to the scammers’ digital account.
Aly Pavela, Twitter spokeswoman, said the social media company is looking into the issue.
