The person that deactivated President Donald Trump's Twitter account briefly Thursday, originally pegged by the company as human error by an employee, reportedly was instead a third-party contractor.
The account was down for 11 minutes. Twitter is investigating the incident but two sources told the New York Times the culprit is now believed to be a third party.
“The fact that the person who disabled President Trump's Twitter account may have been a contractor is a powerful example that demonstrates that organizations are on the hook when any third party with access to their data makes a mistake, whether intentional or accidental,” said Fred Kneip, CEO, CyberGRX. “This contractor is likely one of tens of thousands of third parties Twitter interacts with, any one of whom has the ability to do high-profile and lasting damage to the company's brand value and bottom line.”
Kneip noted that “while even the most thorough risk assessment can't guarantee that one rogue contractor won't make a bad decision, it can uncover red flags that point to weak security controls, leaving the company vulnerable.”
