Popular domain name blogger still doesn’t have control of his account five days after hacking.
Michael Berkens and his company Worldwide Media, Inc. have sued Twitter (pdf) and the unknown person who has control over his @thedomains handle.
On December 22 someone gained access to the @thedomains account and started tweeting. Some of the tweets taunted followers and Berkens about the account being hacked.
Despite numerous reports to Twitter, Berkens still does not have control of the account.
In the lawsuit, Berkens states that he and his company have paid twitter “substantial amounts of money to use and promote the Account, and otherwise have devoted extensive resources and time to using and promoting the Account.”
Whoever hacked the account seems to have a good read on Berkens, as many of the retweets and comments allude to Berkens’ interests.
I suspect the primary goal of the lawsuit is to recover the account, but it also asks for damages and for Twitter to remind its users about available security tools like two-factor authentication, which was only made available this year.
Speaking of which, go turn on two-factor authentication for your account.
Nuno Calico says
Good luck to Michael!
David says
A real shame. When a company of this magnitude doesn’t have telephone support something is wrong. Shame on Twitter.
Vito says
Thats exactly the word ive been using all over NP and especially twitter this past week Shame on Twitter.
I really hope Berkens wins this case and sets a new precedent for the god awful, non existent support twitter does not have.
Still cant believe none of the twitter higher ups who we have tweeted to over and over, still cant believe tgey did not hear us.
I dont believe they use their own site at all.
Shameful.
todd says
What do the over 3,000 employees for the company actually do then?
chandan says
retweets 😉
Kev says
Actually it’s a smart move and the reason is Twitter can reverse the transaction quite easily. I’m not so sure Mikes account was hacked versus Twitters. I investigate these types of cases and find a lot of times it’s espinoge.
Robert says
While I feel terrible that Michael lost his account, never fun to be hacked, its also kind of funny watching him and Schwartz huffing and puffing at Twitter as if they care about a little tantrum
1) HE failed to protect his own account, not Twitter
2) Twitter has had 2 factor authentication for a LONG time (just not via app, only via SMS until recently) and he chose not to use it.
3) For someone who claims to have this much invested in twitter, he could have applied for a verified account – they would have forced him to add 2FA in the process
3) He will probably get his account back
4) They will laugh off any other request for damages, etc, while they point at their very well written TOS that protects them from lawsuits like these.
Andrew Allemann says
Speaking only of #3: twitter denied my request for a verified account for domain name wire despite fake copycat accounts popping up from time to time
Robert says
Oops, had two #3’s
The process may have changed again recently, but you should still try again – there are a bunch of articles about how to get approved, and I’ve helped some other people who are just as notable as yourself get it done. One key item is making sure to include links to articles ABOUT you, not written by you, as well as making sure you have a verified phone, two factor is setup, and a few other things.
Twitter used to have a checklist in their support FAQs, but seems to have disappeared (used to live here https://support.twitter.com/articles/20174631)
Good luck!