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Twitter Birth-Year Hoax Locks Users Out of Accounts

posted by chromas on Wednesday March 27 2019, @08:48PM   Printer-friendly
from the was-anything-of-value-lost dept.

martyb writes:

Twitter Birth-Year Hoax Locks Users Out of Accounts:

Twitter has warned users to ignore a hoax suggesting an alternative colour scheme will appear in the app if they change their birth year to 2007.

Instead, users who fall for the scam will be locked out of their accounts because Twitter prohibits anyone under the age of 13 from using the site.

[...]Twitter has automatically prevented users under 13 from using the social network since May last year and its terms of use state that the social network is "not directed to children."

Within the EU, companies aren't allowed to create contracts of service with users under 13 without parental permission, according to the recently adopted General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Twitter said that anyone locked out of their account erroneously could follow instructions in an email they should have received from Twitter or fill out an online form.

SocialEngineering++

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Wednesday March 27 2019, @08:55PM (7 children)

    by Gaaark (41) on Wednesday March 27 2019, @08:55PM (#820939) Journal

    Maybe they should lock out anyone below a certain IQ level.

    That would drop a lot of Facebook users, at least.

    --
    --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by bob_super on Wednesday March 27 2019, @08:59PM (4 children)

    by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday March 27 2019, @08:59PM (#820946)

    Isn't that partially achieved by locking out people who fall for a stupid internet hoax ?

    "restore my account now !"
    "Sir/Madam, it's probably better for civilization if we keep you offline"

    • (Score: 2) by BsAtHome on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:09PM (3 children)

      by BsAtHome (889) on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:09PM (#820958)

      Is there an alternative Darwin Award for this? If not, we should create one!

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:23PM (2 children)

        by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:23PM (#820971)

        The hunter2 award, maybe ?

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:47PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:47PM (#820977)

          The ******* award?
          Hows that pronounced?

          • (Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:57PM

            by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:57PM (#820980)

            Hey ! How did you get my password ? Did you hack me ? I'm calling the internet police, and the consequences will never be the same !

  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:22PM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 27 2019, @09:22PM (#820969) Journal

    Maybe they should lock out anyone below a certain IQ level.

    Paradoxically, those are the ones a social media should be interested to keep: they do make better consumers than the ones with higher IQ.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 28 2019, @12:55AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 28 2019, @12:55AM (#821078)

    They did.