Who is Victor Gevers? Hacker who cracked Donald Trump's Twitter account used 'MAGA2020!’ password
President Donald Trump once again made headlines, this time not for a controversial tweet but because his Twitter account allegedly got hacked using the password, "MAGA2020!," but the man responsible will not be punished.
According to the Dutch public prosecution, the department believes that Victor Gevers successfully hacked into the US president's account. However, these claims were largely questioned by Twitter and the White House. Gevers allegedly made himself known to the FBI, Twitter, the White House and CIA offering tips on how to toughen security on Trump's account, according to Dutch publication Volkskrant. According to the Public Prosecution Service, this meant that the criminal liability for hacking failed. The "ethical hacker" allegedly took just seven attempts to get into Trump's account in mid-October.
"I thought 'oh god' when I logged in," Gevers told RTL News. "I just don't want me to be able to get in, especially not with such an important account." Gevers also claimed that Trump's account had no extra security or protection. He also said he didn't go through any of his messages. The outlet also claimed that Trump has changed his password and turned on two-step verification.
Gevers also took screenshots of Trump's logged in account and then warned the President and the US Security forces about the account's vulnerability and how easy it is to hack it. Gevers reportedly didn't receive any response for the information but the account's security was tighten the very next day. Just a few days later, Gevers had a meeting with the American Secret Service in the Netherlands who are partly responsible for Trump's security. At the time, Gevers also provided advice for Twitter users, recommending: "Please folks, enable two-step verification. Even if you use a bad password, such as 'maga2020!', you still remain protected against these kinds of simple attacks."
Gevers is the founder of the GDI Foundation, which makes people aware of massive online breaches, the organization had identified around 600,000 such breaches. "Most of these systems are completely open," Gevers told Forbes. "So we don’t need to break the law. We find out the owner of the database and we inform them. Compare us to volunteer firefighters. If we see smoke coming out of a house there is a possible fire. We ensure the fire goes out." He was also responsible for shining a light on the facial recognition of Xinjiang Muslims in China.