Most people take a lot of measures to secure their online bank accounts, credit card accounts, retirement accounts and other financial accounts. This often means enabling some form of multi-factor authentication (MFA), using a strong password, or other means of keeping money safe.
When it comes to other accounts, such as social media accounts however, people are rarely as cautious because they do not understand the potential threats that can arise from using them. Unfortunately, that can be a big mistake that could cost you or your loved ones financial distress, end in legal problems, or even turn into a physical threat.
In this Hacker Story, you will be taken on a journey to find out how reusing a password in multiple places, one that was part of an unrelated data breach, led to people being scammed out of money, police reports, and even a physical threat at someone’s home.
Unfortunately, this account takeover lasted for several months. Due to a photo of a driver’s license being sent in a direct message, the account owner was unable to shut down the scams and had to watch helplessly while their compromised account and reputation was used to scam friends and community members out of their hard-earned money.
This serves as a lesson to not reuse passwords, enable multi-factor authentication, and treat even simple social media accounts as important so you can protect yourself and others you care about.
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