Posts Tagged ‘social networking’

How to protect your Twitter account from being hacked!

Oct 6 2009

Caprica
“Caprica” 5DMKII, Sigma 15mm f/2.8, HDR, cross-processed.

My Twitter page has been restored finally! Turns out someone hacked into my account and deleted it. They then locked me out of my account by creating a fake email in my name and linking it to my account, so I couldn’t reset my password. Awesome! *writes a list of people who may hate me*

At any rate, I have learnt some valuable lessons in protecting my social media from being hacked:

  1. Set a Very Strong Twitter password. One that isn’t your favourite sports team, colour, a sequence of numbers like 123456, the word “password” or “iheartRobertPattinson”.
  2. Create unique passwords for your Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, Blog & other social nets. If one is compromised, you could lose your entire lifestream. I used the same password for many accounts. And though it was a strong password, I think the fact that I used it for everything made it vulnerable.
  3. Be careful giving out your Twitter username and password to 3rd Party Apps. I had four 3rd party Twitter apps on my iPhone, two desktop apps, in addition to TwitPic, Flickr to Twitter app, Twitter to Facebook app, and many others I didn’t even remember I had signed up for. Be very cautious and keep track of which apps use your password.
  4. Link your phone number to your Twitter account, so that it can be used to retrieve your password in the event that your account and email address is compromised. You can plug your phone number into Twitter under the device tab.
  5. Back-up your Twitter! I would’ve never even considered this before, but the thought losing 2 1/2 years of tweet history made me sad. So sad I had to eat many cupcakes. Many. It wasn’t pretty folks. There are several services that allow you to back up your Tweets, including BackupmyTweets, TweetBackup, TweeTake & Twistory. I’m going to try few. I’ll get back to you on which one is the best.

After nearly a week of being without a tweet, I realize how pathetically dependent I am on Twitter and how much time I actually spend Twittering. Because without it, I wander the web aimlessly, listen and download an embarrassing amount of tv shows & indie music. Then there’s the watching of said depressing music, tv shows, and the slow deterioration of said tv shows from witty British mockumentaries to crappy CW teen vampire dramas.

All I have to say is vampires should eat cheerleaders, not play football in the sunlight. #vampirediaries

Do you have any tips on how to protect or backup your social media?

A part of me died when Britney signed up for Twitter

Oct 20 2008

Remember when Twitter was elitist and cool and way geeky? When tweets actually contained thoughts or links to sweet content? When the twitter was, like, our geeky secret club of social 2.0 misfits?

Twitter is about connecting, about sharing, about helping each other through our daily geeky struggles with toasted HDs, exploding MBPs, 404s and other jedi mind tricks.

That’s all gone now because therealbritney is on Twitter. Yeah, even Britney Spears can’t get her own name on twitter. Anyway, I won’t start that rant about how some jerk took @mostlylisa on Twitter!

Stop the madness and just say NO! No Britney we will not follow you, or @ you, or retweet any of your lame blogs or blog entries. I’m glad your management team has finally discovered the power of social media, but Twitter is our world and you and your nekkid videos can take a hike off my feed.

Now say after me:

I promise to not follow Britney Spears on Twitter

Good! Now I wanna see your solemn vow in my comments!

NB. I will, however, continue to listen to your music while cleaning and doing laundry and perhaps dancing in front of a mirror with a Swiffer Sweeper.