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Mashable

Leaked: A 'hide checkmark' option for shy Twitter Blue users (Fri, 24 Mar 2023)
Since Elon Musk rolled out the ability for any Twitter user to pay $8 to receive a verified badge, the blue checkmark that comes with a Twitter Blue subscription has become a mark of shame in the eyes of many. Twitter Blue subscribers have been trolled since the subscription plan's launch, with memes like the popular "this mf paid for Twitter" used by the old legacy verified users and non-verified users alike. It's gotten so bad for the Twitter users paying $8 per month that the company is looking into maybe allowing Blue subscribers to completely hide the badge. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) According to a screenshot leaked by app researcher Alessandro Paluzzi, Twitter is apparently testing out the ability for users to "show or hide the blue checkmark" in the verification settings for Twitter Blue users. For some, the decision to roll out such an option might seem confusing. However, unlike much of what Twitter has done since Musk's takeover, it actually makes a bit of sense. And even more so in the context of a recent announcement from the company. On Thursday, after Twitter announced that Twitter Blue was officially available for users located anywhere in the world, Musk followed up with another piece of news: Legacy verified users on Twitter – the celebrities, artists, and journalists who were deemed "notable" users and had their identification verified by the previous Twitter regime for free – would lose their verified account status starting April 1.  Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) When Musk's verification plan started rolling out, the main selling point of Twitter Blue seemed to be the verified badge, which allows paid users to digitally rub elbows with the legacy verified users. The paid Blue checkmark and the legacy checkmark are indistinguishable, unless a user tapped on the badge, which would then open a pop-up that denoted what type of verified account it was. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) With mostly just Twitter Blue subscribers left with a checkmark (along with accounts associated with verified organizations), the verification badge will become a "kick me" sign. Those users won't look like possible "notable" individuals if most of the notable accounts are unverified. Instead, it will just be a mark that you paid Elon Musk $8 a month (or $11 per month on mobile.) So, if you are set on removing the legacy verified badges, as Musk apparently is, the next best thing if you still want people to subscribe to Twitter Blue is to let them hide the badge so they're not paying to be bullied on the platform. Musk rolled out Twitter Blue fairly quickly after he officially acquired the company last year. Twitter lost around half of its advertisers after Musk took charge – and is still struggling when it comes to ad revenue. The subscription revenue model was meant to help with the losses. However, advertising previously made up around 90 percent of Twitter's $5 billion revenue in 2021. Twitter Blue has only managed to sign up a few hundred thousand users, or a few decimals of a percentage point of Twitter's entire monthly active user base. The company has also rolled out a gold checkmark verified badge for companies, which costs a whopping $1,000 per month. It's unclear if the removal of legacy verification badges will give Twitter Blue a bump in subscribers, although based on the reaction to the sunsetting of legacy checkmarks, it doesn't seem likely.  One thing that does seem for sure though: Use of the "this mf paid for Twitter" meme is about to go way, way up.
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'10 Macbooks' Twitter hack update: Not even Smash Mouth is safe (Fri, 24 Mar 2023)
Don't be left with the shape of an "L" on your forehead: If you see a celebrity selling, oh say, 10 MacBooks for around $600 each on Twitter, we can guarantee that the celeb's account has been hacked...even if the account belongs to the internet's favorite 90s band: Smash Mouth. Over the past few months, a hacker or group of hackers have been stealing influential high-profile accounts. Mashable first exclusively reported on the hacks last week.  Basically, once the hacker accesses an account, they begin sharing a scam offering brand new MacBooks for well-below retail value. Mashable heard from those who fell for the scam, taken in by seeing the offer from a user they've long followed and trusted, without knowing that the account had been hacked. The victim then sends the money via a peer-to-peer payment service like Zelle, Cashapp, or Apple Pay, which does not provide buyer protection or refunds. Hey now, you're an all-star On the day our report was published, the hacker reached out to the author of the piece through a Twitter account they had just hacked hours prior. "i’ll hack you next," the hacker said in a direct message to me via the Twitter account belonging to Smash Mouth. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) "ur 2 step dosent matter ," they said in a follow up, referring to two-factor authentication, a security step that makes it harder for unauthorized access into accounts. Twitter, under the leadership of Elon Musk, turned off two-factor authentication via text message that same day for Twitter users unless they paid to subscribe to Twitter Blue. Shortly after those messages, the Smash Mouth Twitter account deleted the MacBook scam tweets and published a new post saying that the band once again had access to the account. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) "We finally got our account back," @SmashMouth tweeted. "Fuck those hackers." However, that was not true. That tweet was also from the hacker. The hackers, posing as Smash Mouth, claimed the band got their account back. They did not. Credit: Mashable Screenshot "PAGE IS STILL HACKED," tweeted Ron Xepoleas of Smash Mouth's management. "THIS IS NOT SMASH MOUTH POSTING!" Mashable reached out to Xepoleas, who explained that this is the second time the Smash Mouth account was hacked. And, it may very well be by the same hacker too. Back in late October of last year, verified Twitter users reported receiving DMs from the Smash Mouth account asking them to go to a Twitter page to verify their Twitter account or they'd lose their checkmark. The page, of course, was a fake phishing page set up to steal their information. The DM from October looks exactly the same as the DM we previously reported on that's being used by the hackers stealing accounts today. The only difference is that the hackers have moved on to a new website URL. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Xepoleas explained that he fell for the hack the first time and clicked on the link himself. However, he is unsure how the hackers got access to the account again this year. When Smash Mouth was hacked the first time, it was just days before Elon Musk officially acquired Twitter so there were delays in getting the account back. It took over a month for someone at Twitter to help out. And unfortunately for Smash Mouth, the Twitter employee who helped them last time was fired by Musk in the most recent round of Twitter layoffs last month. "All we know is since Elon took over we've been hacked twice and have lost over 40k followers," Xepoleas told me. As of publishing time, the Smash Mouth account was still hacked. You might as well be walking on the sun Since Mashable's first report, we have heard from numerous people sharing their stories about other hacked accounts. And, multiple accounts have been hacked just this past week, since we've reached out to Twitter to inform them of the issue. Many of these accounts are still hacked, active, and scamming users. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Rapper Action Bronson's account was hacked and pushed the "10 MacBooks" scam back in November of last year. Comedian Bobby Lee's Twitter account, @BobbyLeeLive, was also hacked back during that month and first tweeted the "10 MacBooks" scheme on Nov. 15 of last year. In fact, it appears his account is still hacked over 4 months later. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Last year, a number of his fans immediately noticed the hack and screenshotted tweets of the account offering "10 MacBooks" for sale for $600. "Hello twitter family !" reads the November tweet. "I have 10 MacBooks that I will personally sign myself , that you can purchase for $600 and free Shipping ! First come first serve basis , and all proceeds will be going to charity ! MY DMS ARE OPENED IF INTERESTED." A screenshot of the "10 MacBooks" scam being tweeted from Bobby Lee's account in November 2022. Credit: Mashable Screenshot If that message looks familiar, that's because it's the same exact tweet that was posted on hacked accounts belonging to Duck Dynasty's Jase Robertson, The American Prospect's David Dayen, and Winnie Wong of Bernie Sanders' 2020 presidential campaign, per Mashable's last report on the issue. It appears the same tweet gets posted on all of these hacked accounts. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Throughout the next few months, the Bobby Lee account would continue to post tweets attempting to scam his followers. Hundreds of other Twitter users, including other influential Twitter accounts, reported Lee's hacked account to Twitter. However, the company did not respond. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Most of the scam tweets on Bobby Lee's account are no longer visible on the platform. It's unclear if the scammer removed the missing tweets or if the tweets were auto-removed due to mass user reporting of the specific tweets. It does not look like Twitter specifically intervened, however, as a scam tweet from February still appears on the account. The hacks keep coming and they don't stop coming Raffi Cavoukian, the beloved children's singer, was targeted by these hackers earlier this week. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Raffi told Mashable that he received a DM from Asami Terajima, a journalist with Kyiv Independent. However, Terajima's account was hacked. And, oddly enough, the scammer targeting Raffi had changed Terajima's profile name to look like the account belonging to Justin Sun, a controversial cryptocurrency founder who was charged with fraud by the SEC just days later. The DM sent from Terajima's hacked account to Raffi included the same DM message linking to a phishing page made up to look like an official Twitter site. The URL used this time was "security-twitter.com," the same domain we reported on last time that was being sent from Winnie Wong's hacked account. A screenshot of the phishing page used by the scammers to steal accounts. Credit: Mashable Screenshot Kyiv Independent senior editor Oleksiy Sorokin confirmed that they were able to regain access to Terajima's account. "Also, @elonmusk and @TwitterSupport thanks for removing the basic safety features," he tweeted. "Great job." Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) While Raffi was able to avoid getting hacked, others haven't been so lucky. On Thursday night actress Rachel Zegler's Twitter account began posting the "10 MacBooks" scam tweets. This time, the hackers deployed a new measure to hide their scam. They first made Zegler's account private, so only her current followers could see her tweets. This would make it more difficult for outside parties, like reporters who might be familiar with the scam, to track her hacked account and warn her fans.  Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) As of Friday, the Shazam! actress' account was unlocked. A tweet from the account claimed that Zegler had regained control, but it's worth noting that that Smash Mouth's account once falsely claimed that its rightful owners had regained access. In addition to Zegler, a string of well-known drag queens, such as Gottmik from RuPaul's Drag Race were also hacked and tweeting out the "10 MacBooks" scam this week as well. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) Of course, hacks and phishing scams are not new and they are not unique to any social media website. However, of the hacked users we spoke to, all pointed out that the lack of a significant response from Twitter itself in the aftermath of Elon Musk's takeover is not something that they experienced on the platform before. With Twitter's plan to remove the verification badge from all influential and high-profile users who don't pay, it seems the opportunities for scammers looking to impersonate celebrities is only going to multiply. Mashable reached out to Twitter for comment. The company's press email auto-responded with a poop emoji. Twitter's Head of Trust and Safety, Ella Irwin, did publicly respond on Twitter on March 18 to a user inquiring about Mashable's first report on the issue. Tweet may have been deleted (opens in a new tab) "I don’t know what DMs were received but we will investigate Matt’s account compromise report and any others we are notified about," Irwin tweeted. "I would not automatically assume Matt’s account compromise is directly related to any others."
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Marketing

Dove's Latest Campaign Takes On A Popular TikTok Filter (Tue, 28 Mar 2023)
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AR vs. VR: Which Is More Effective for Marketing [+Consumer Data] (Tue, 28 Mar 2023)
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The 60 Second Marketer Blog | Insider Tips from Experts Around the Globe

Great Examples of User-Generated Content (UGC) (Mon, 27 Mar 2023)
User-generated content (UGC) is created and published by unpaid contributors. UGC’s most popular version of content would be photos, video and text; the great thing with UGC is that once consumers post on social media, they will influence their followers’ buying habits. Around 85% of people have said that user-generated content is more influential than […] The post <strong>Great Examples of User-Generated Content (UGC)</strong> appeared first on 60 Second Marketer @AskJamieTurner.
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Reasons Why You Need Software Development Services For Your Business (Mon, 27 Mar 2023)
As businesses expand and modernize, software development services become a necessity. As technology demand rises, software development is crucial to a company’s growth strategy. Businesses need software development services to keep up with the rapidly evolving technological landscape. In addition, companies need to adopt the technology to cater to the demands of modern consumers who […] The post Reasons Why You Need Software Development Services For Your Business appeared first on 60 Second Marketer @AskJamieTurner.
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Cybersecurity for Marketers: Ensuring Data Privacy and Customer Trust (Mon, 27 Mar 2023)
Current technology allows marketers to reach new consumers at an unprecedented rate. Social media and email marketing campaigns can simultaneously target millions of online users, often with highly efficient personalized messages. However, using personally identifiable data (PII) has become problematic during the last decade. Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) strictly administers the collection, retention, […] The post Cybersecurity for Marketers: Ensuring Data Privacy and Customer Trust appeared first on 60 Second Marketer @AskJamieTurner.
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ProBlogger

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