On October 1, Microsoft’s official X account was hijacked. The account has over 13 million followers. The former was utilized to promote a fake Clippy-themed cryptocurrency for a short time. Clippy is Microsoft’s old animated paperclip assistant. The former was introduced with Office 97 and later discontinued. For your knowledge Microsoft’s profile picture was replaced with one of Clippy.

For a short period one of the most popular corporate accounts was used as a tool for committing cryptocurrency fraud. The official account has got back the owner’s control and the unauthorized posts deleted. On October 1st afternoon the @Microsoft account started following a Clippy crypto account with the name @clippymsftco. An apology was posted around 30 minutes later and was subsequently deleted.

A Microsoft spokesperson stated, “We have confirmed unauthorized access to our account on X, including posts that did not originate from Microsoft,” adding, “The account has been secured, the unauthorized posts have been removed, and we are continuing to investigate the circumstances.” Microsoft has not given any details on how the attackers got access to its account. Note that this is not the first time a Microsoft X account has been compromised.

SOURCES:-

https://www.securityweek.com/crypto-scammers-hijack-microsofts-official-x-account/

https://www.scworld.com/brief/microsoft-x-account-hijacked-for-crypto-scam

https://cybernews.com/news/microsoft-x-account-hijacked-clippy-crypto-scam/

https://finance.biggo.com/news/8962893c-24e7-4faf-aa28-1a042dfe1b49

https://cryptorank.io/news/feed/2d182-microsoft-x-account-hijacked-clippy-crypto-scam