Hacking isn’t the only way in which confidential information can leak on the Internet. Sometimes it can happen merely by mistake. A recent case shows that quite well. Owen Smith, the UK’s Labour Party leadership candidate, published a photo on Twitter that contained his phone-bank information – client ID, username, and password.
Leaking Your Personal Data
The PR team of Owen Smith published a photo on his official Twitter page. It seems like a regular press release snap of a politician – Owen Smith giving a talking to his team. However, a little detail that slipped into the picture is a white board in the background where the information of the candidate’s campaign phone-bank accounts.
The picture was released to the public. Owen Smith’s Twitter followers quickly spotted the screw-up and the picture was removed soon after. Of course, this is the Internet we’re talking about, so the picture was copied, and nothing dies on the Internet. The picture is going to remain with us forever. Luckily, there weren’t any unknown third parties gaining access to the account. It’s still a pretty awkward mistake.
One user jokes on Twitter that if Smith becomes the UK’s prime minister he shouldn’t be so careless with the launch codes. The story was originally reported by the Huffington Post.
Picture From @Angry_Voice ‘s Twitter
Further Details
The password that the possible leader of Britain used for his accounts was “Survation”, the name of a British survey agency. It’s a pretty weak password that can be cracked easily by most password cracking devices. Even important and influential people often opt for simple and unsecure passwords.
Mark Zuckerberg used the password “dadada” for one of his accounts that was hacked by OurMine. In fact, OurMine’s alleged goal is to show that everyone can be hacked, and so far, they’re pretty much right, as they’ve breached the Twitter accounts of Wikipedia founder Jimmy Welles, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and other big name Silicon Valley executives.
Passwords and Protection
If Owen Smith’s data didn’t leak in such an embarrassing way, it’s very easy to imagine that it would’ve been stolen by hackers. The “Survation” password uses only one capital letter and no symbols, numbers, and it’s rather short. Passwords continue to be neglected by people. A strong password, however, is the easiest step to increase your cybersecurity. It may also be a bad idea to password scoring meters trust the too much.
It doesn’t matter if you’re leading a major organization, a regular user, or a candidate for the leadership of Uk’s Labour Party, you should improve your security habits. You should consider making your password stronger. You can also use specialized password software like Keepass. Our team provided a tutorial on how to use the program .
There’s also another, very important point that you may want to remember. Are you ready? Don’t post pictures of your password on Twitter. This can be quite shocking to some. All jokes aside, Owen Smith is very lucky that his account wasn’t drained as soon as the picture was posted. Some of his PR staff would probably get fired over this.