Twitter accidentally sends out mass password reset email

Your Twitter account might have been hacked today, although it probably wasn’t. Confused? So were a number of Twitter users around the world after they received an email telling them to change their passwords.

The social network says it sent out a legitimate email to some users whose accounts had been hacked, but “unintentionally” reset the passwords of a number of people whose accounts were fine.

Among those affected by the hack was tech blog TechCrunch and popular comedian David Mitchell.

Given that hackers managed to get their hands on a load of LinkedIn passwords earlier this year it would be understandable if Twitter overreacted in the face of a mass hack threat.

Whether you got the email or not, changing your password regularly is a pretty good idea and will only make your account safer.

Here’s the full statement from Twitter’s status blog:

We’re committed to keeping Twitter a safe and open community. As part of that commitment, in instances when we believe an account may have been compromised, we reset the password and send an email letting the account owner know this has happened along with information about creating a new password. This is a routine part of our processes to protect our users.

In this case, we unintentionally reset passwords of a larger number of accounts, beyond those that we believed to have been compromised. We apologize for any inconvenience or confusion this may have caused.

As always, we recommend that people review these tips on how to keep their Twitter accounts secure: https://support.twitter.com/articles/76036-keeping-your-account-secure#