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Weak Password Brings “Happiness” to Twitter Hacker

January 9, 2009
by Kim Zetter
Blogger, Wired.com, Threat Level

Kim Zetter

An 18-year-old hacker with a history of celebrity pranks has admitted to Monday’s hijacking of multiple high-profile Twitter accounts, including President-Elect Barack Obama’s, and the official feed for Fox News.

The hacker, who goes by the handle GMZ, told Threat Level on Tuesday he gained entry to Twitter’s administrative control panel by pointing an automated password-guesser at a popular user’s account. The user turned out to be a member of Twitter’s support staff, who’d chosen the weak password “happiness.”

Cracking the site was easy, because Twitter allowed an unlimited number of rapid-fire log-in attempts.

“I feel it’s another case of administrators not putting forth effort toward one of the most obvious and overused security flaws,” he wrote in an IM interview. “I’m sure they find it difficult to admit it.”

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