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Twitter warning: If you reset your password, we have bad news
It’s always a good idea to change your passwords often. With security breaches happening constantly and personal details being put up for sale on the Dark Web, it’s one of the ways you can keep your information safe. Scam alert: five most costly data breaches (plus five states most targeted).
Your social media details are precious to hackers, which is why some sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, use two-factor authentication. But if you recently reset your Twitter password, there’s a problem.
Read on for details on a recent password glitch that could jeopardize your account.
Here’s the backstory
You might want to change or reset any password for several reasons. Most people change their passwords if it’s been found in a breached database.
You typically reset a password if you’ve forgotten what it is. Most sites, including Twitter, have a link on the sign-in page that guides you through the steps. It’s a relatively mundane exercise. The hardest part is thinking of a strong password. Tap or click here if you want help creating stronger passwords.
In theory, what should happen is the service automatically signs you out of all devices where you are logged in. For example, if you initiate a reset on a desktop computer, it will sign you out of any mobile apps until you enter the new password. This is also handy if your device is stolen or lost, as you deny access to whoever has it.
However, a bug in Twitter’s operations recently failed to log out users from all devices after a password reset. That means some devices still allowed access to Twitter accounts, even though the passwords didn’t match.
What you can do about it
Twitter explains in a blog post that it has fixed the issue but had to log out thousands of users to keep them safe. Twitter sent notifications to the people it had to log out, so your account is secured if you didn’t get a message.
But to be safe, we recommend changing your Twitter password ASAP. You can also check out some settings to ensure that nothing is amiss with your account.
The most important of these is the Review active open session controls. This shows you all the devices and instances you are currently logged in.
Keep reading
Twitter data breach: Personal details of 5.4M users leaked
Twitter shares your location when you tweet – Take this step now
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