Handing your Twitter account to minions to post for you is common in the celebrity game, though some, like UK TV presenter Jonathon Ross, like to do it themselves. That latter strategy may well have been proved to be the wiser one. The perils of handing the Twitter keys to others has just been proved by singer Britney Spears.
Most people know that it is her staff, not her, that updates her Twitter account, but today that may have proved to have been be a bad decision. Very bad. Her latest update, said: “HI Yall! Brit Brit here, just wanted to update you all on the size of my vagina. Its about 4 feet wide with razor sharp teeth.” [Screen grab below]. The update has now been removed.
Britney has 14,095 followers on Twitter. If this is an employee and not a hacker, something tells me she’ll be running the account differently in future.
Update: It looks like it was in fact a hacker. Obama and US TV presenter Bill O’Reilly’s twitter accounts have been got at as well. TechCrunch.com has more.
Awesome. Just what I wanted for 2009
Oh that is nasty ! Seriously why would someone add such a nasty comment (even if they seriously dislike Britney)
Someone’s been having a hacking field day by the looks of things…Fox News has also been caught out. By someone who doesn’t like Bill O Riley (sic) by the looks of things. (via Valleywag)
There is always the option that she sent this herself while under the influence of something.
Heh – it’s quite amusing, you must admit.
Sorry Mike, I have to do the obligatory plug though – If she’d (or Sony BMG, I presume) had used a company like http://wearesocial.net/ to advise her (as Stephen Fry has done), she wouldn’t be in this situation…
Stephen Fry: “Lawks. Hope I haven’t been phished for all my details. Clicked on scam URL last night before I knew what it was. Eeek. x” about 22 hours ago from Tweetie
ooooooooooo r ya, are ya farting ok?
What I love about this story is that Mr Fry will notice, comment and probably delete the Tweet. He’s an active, transparent, user and not all about the self-publicity and self-absorption.
Getting hacked can be a badge of honour, like having your own stalker was in the late 90s. As @builtbydave points out there is little harm done when the service doesn’t include direct debit payments, bank details, etc. I’m much more concerned about Gmail (or even Audible) accounts getting hacked.
If I was a celebrity I think I could laugh it off pretty quick.
extremely awesome.
Until Twitter implement a mechanism to allow controlled access to your account without giving out your password, then (and the recent spate of phishing attacks) is just going to keep happening ..
Hmm, maybe “Twatter” ?