Twitter "onMouseOver" Exploit, #NewTwitter, and New Features Put Twitter PR to the Test
Twitter's communications team had quite a day today, no doubt. Between a massive and quickly spreading exploit early this morning, the ongoing launch of "New Twitter," and releasing two new, much-requested features for "New Twitter" users, they've had a lot on their plate.
The fun began this morning with a security exploit that opened pop-up windows and redirected users to other sites whenever they moused over (thus the name, "onMouseOver," after the code used in the exploit) a specific link in a tweet. Although the exploit caused no damage and spread no viruses, it duped users far and wide, including some of the celebrity twitter users.
Photo courtesy of TechCrunch
Twitter recovered quickly, however, and posted a concise and well-written blog entry explaining the situation shortly after it all ended. Later this afternoon, they released a "reply all" feature and autocomplete for usernames in the new Twitter interface. Whether this was scheduled for release today or pushed out to combat negative press over the onMouseOver is unknown.
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