Joe Biden's tweetIn a major security breach, the Twitter accounts of influential American personalities including former president Barack Obama, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, tech entreprenuer Elon Musk were hacked by cryptocurrency scammers on Wednesday (16 July).
The accounts, along with those of Kanye West, Kim Kardashian West, Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos and Mike Bloomberg, posted similar tweets asking donations via Bitcoin to their verified profiles on Wednesday.
"Everyone is asking me to give back, and now is the time," Gates' tweet said.
The tweet then asked for Gates' followers to send Bitcoin payments to an address, promising to double all the payments made in the "next 30 minutes".
Similar messages were sent from other influential twitter users' accounts.
After the incident, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said that it was a "tough day" for the company.
"We’re diagnosing and will share everything we can when we have a more complete understanding of exactly what happened," he said.
According to the New York Times, by Wednesday evening, the Bitcoin wallets promoted in the tweets had received over 300 transactions and Bitcoin worth over $110,000.
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