Twitter Hack: Elon Musk, Kanye West, Bill Gates, And More Hacked In Bitcoin Scam [Update]

[Update: Verified accounts have once again been given the ability to tweet. The cause appears to be a hacker gaining access to Twitter's "admin" tool, which essentially gave them the ability to post from any account they wanted. Twitter said the perpetrators targeted employees who had access to "internal systems and tools" in order to gain entry.]

A number of high profile accounts have been hacked on Twitter, all tweeting out Bitcoin scams. Reported by CNET, the Twitter accounts of Bill Gates, Kanye West, Elon Musk, Apple, and other high profile and verified accounts have been compromised, all tweeting out a similar Bitcoin scam.

Kanye's since deleted tweet said "I am giving back to my fans. All Bitcoin sent to my address below will be sent back doubled. I am only doing a maximum of $10,000,000." The Bitcoin address given in the tweet was identical to the address in Gates', Musk's, and Apple's hacked tweets.

The official Twitter Support account posted a statement saying that they are aware of the issue and are investigating. Given the high-profile nature of all the accounts, including Barack Obama and Joe Biden, they most likely use two-factor authentication, so the hacked tweets are most likely not the result of their passwords being figured out.

A spokesperson for Gates confirmed that the tweet was not sent by Gates and it part of a larger issue that Twitter is aware of and actively dealing with.

The official Cash App account also sent out a similar tweet, however it contained a different Bitcoin address. A number of crypto currency accounts, like Gemini and Coinbase, have also been compromised. It is currently unknown how all of these accounts are being accessed, but the large number of high-profile accounts being accessed suggests a serious security issue.

At the time of writing this, the scammers Bitcoin address has reportedly gained about $100,000 from the scams, according to the publicly visible transactions.

You should be wary of any tweets you see related to sending Bitcoin to people and in the wise words of DrLupo,

While no high-profile gaming accounts have been hacked as of yet, the unprecedented attack has prompted some responses from those in gaming circles.

As of about 3:20 p.m. PST, Twitter has locked all verified accounts from posting news tweets. It appears that verified users can still like and retweet, but cannot draft and post new tweets.

This story is developing