Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s Twitter account was seemingly hacked on Friday afternoon by a group that calls itself the Chuckle Squad. Twitter’s communications team issued a statement via Twitter.
We’re aware that @jack was compromised and investigating what happened.— Twitter Comms (@TwitterComms) August 30, 2019
The hackers tweeted racist terms from Dorsey’s account. The offensive tweets started being deleted not long after the attack began, but some were up for approximately 10 minutes. The hackers also used their time controlling Dorsey’s account to plug a Discord server used for their own activity, asking people to join. The server invitation link tweeted out by the hackers is no longer valid at this time. Following the incident, “both the server and the server owner were permanently removed from Discord within minutes of this being reported to us,” a Discord representative told The Verge.
“Encouraging any kind of hacking is in direct violation of our Terms of Service,” the representative said. “We will continue to monitor and investigate this incident.”
Reports suggest the tweets came from a source called Cloudhopper, a company that Twitter previously acquired to help with its SMS service. Dorsey’s account was previously hacked in 2016 by the security firm OurMine. The group used the hack to include a message about “testing your security,” and tweeted out a link to its website.
.@Jack’s account has been hacked. The Tweets are coming from a source called Cloudhopper. Cloudhopper was the name of the company Twitter acquired a long time ago to help bolster their SMS service.Looks like the hackers are Tweeting via the old SMS service… pic.twitter.com/YcU3DTn9wS— Sam (@Hooray) August 30, 2019
It appears to be the same group that attacked a number of YouTube creators and influencers last week on Twitter, including beauty vlogger James Charles, Shane Dawson, and comedian King Bach. The hackers also allegedly gained access to Desmond “Etika” Amofah’s Gmail account, as seen by screenshots collected in their Discord server.
Many of the influencers and YouTubers at the time suggested their accounts were breached following a SIM card swap conducted by AT
