Over the weekend, British Gas customers seeking help from the company's social media team noticed some strange tweets, accompanied by links leading to a phishing.
The links were all shortened, so an unsuspecting user tries to find out what was so funny, interesting, and cool that the support team felt the need to share it with the world. No one could imagine that the page was actually an attempted phishing, to collect users' credentials.
According to security expert Graham Cluley, the links opened a page asking the victim to enter their Twitter username and password because the session required a restart.
Aside from the URL revealing the attempted scam, the rest indicates that the page is a legitimate Twitter announcement.
British Gas has a reputable Twitter account, which provides credibility to users. Links to messages from a trusted source are more likely to be followed by users as they are more believable.
Fortunately, British Gas managed to regain control of its Twitter account and informed users about the incident, advising them to delete any spam tweets they received.
