Twitter Hijack/Hacked Account – What To Do If It Happens To YOU!

As social media managers we use Twitter 24/7.  We use it on behalf of clients and we use it for our own company.  We have damage limitation procedures in place just in case anything untoward were to happen to any of our clients accounts, but imagine our surprise (and anger) when our own company Twitter account was hacked at 4pm (UK time) this afternoon.

Luckily, being in the job we are, we knew exactly what to do and how to limit the impact.  We already had procedures in place so that within just 2 hours we had a new account running and had kept in contact with our followers, informed twitter and started the ball rolling back into the Twitterverse.

Here is how you can help yourself if your Twitter account is compromised in some way.

1 – DON’T PANIC!  I know this is an easy thing to say and believe me it is hard not to panic, but don’t, just follow our steps to get your Twitter account up and running again (and to reclaim your sanity!)

2 – Announce on Twitter through your status update that you have been hacked/hijacked/impersonated/compromised and ask everyone on your list to retweet (RT) the message for you.

3 – Inform @twitter (Twitter support) and @ev (CEO of Twitter) of the situation.

4 – Go to http://twitter.zendesk.com/requests/new and submit a help request.  Use as much detail as you can about what has happened and press ‘Submit’.

5 – Start a new Twitter account as a temporary account that you can use (all will become clear on why you need this in a mo!) and follow everyone on your old account ‘following’ list.  Make sure you choose a very obscure password!

6 – Wait for the barrage of emails that you will receive from Twitter, most of these will be automated, however one will be asking you for more information so make sure you keep that one and reply to it as soon as possible.

7 – Ask your followers to retweet your new account name.

8 – Wait for the final reply from Twitter (final, at the moment that is) that will tell you that they may close your account whilst they investigate your situation.  Now you see why we say open a second account!

9 – Keep tweeting about what has happened so that all your followers know what has happened to you and so that they are aware that you have moved account.

10 – Keep track your old account, watch what happens your old accounts timeline,  keep an eye on your inbox and make sure you use all available channels to you to spread the word of what has happened.

Whatever happens to your old account and however long it takes Twitter to get it sorted, you know you have done everything you can to keep your profile up and running.  All your followers know what has happened, Twitter knows and more importantly you have regained control.  Don’t let the spammers and the hackers get away with it!

To keep in contact with us while our old account is being investigated after we became hacked, please follow @SallyWalker – see you on the flip side!