Every website has a source code that makes it run the way it is. It's one of the most guarded codes seeing as it could expose a website's vulnerabilities. Just recently, reports say that parts of Twitter's code have been leaked online.
Exposed Source Code
The parts of the source code leaked online were found on GitHub. Twitter managed to resolve the issue by sending a copyright infringement notice to the hosting service, resulting in the leaked code being taken down.
Despite the code being taken down the same day GitHub received the notice, no one can say for sure how long the code has been posted. As mentioned in Engadget, it may have been public for at least a few months.
It's only recently that the executives of Twitter found out about the leak, as mentioned by the employees involved in the internal investigation. The exposure could lead to hackers exploiting the code and using it to steal user data or even take down the site.
Along with an internal investigation, Twitter also asked for the help of the US District Court for the Northern District of California to urge GitHub to identify who posted the code, as well as others who may have downloaded the data.
Twitter executives strongly believe that the person behind the leak is a former employee, which may have been impacted by the mass layoffs conducted by the company, or among the ones that left due to the extreme working environment.
Weirdly enough, the leak was detected just a few days before March 31st, which is when Elon Musk claimed to take select parts of Twitter's code public. According to Musk's post on Twitter, the code that will be open-sourced is used to recommend tweets.
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A Former Employee May Have Done It
The person on GitHub behind the leak goes by the username "FreeSpeechEnthusiast," which may be a reference to Musk advocating for free speech within the social media platform. The profile is also said to remain online until now.
Twitter CEO Elon Musk was very careful during layoffs to avoid this kind of incident. According to The New York Times, he wouldn't even let employees come in while cuts are being made. Engineers are also not allowed to alter the site's code after layoffs.
A threat analyst at Emsisoft, Brett Callow said that one of the best ways to mitigate insider risk is to keep employees happy. However, based on several reports concerning Elon Musk's takeover, that's not the case.
If it is true that an ex-employee is behind the leak on GitHub, it still doesn't narrow down who it could possibly be. Elon Musk reduced Twitter's workforce by 80%, which resulted in thousands of potentially disgruntled employees.
That's not even counting the ones that remained who chose to leave after the tech billionaire set extreme workplace policies in place. There was even an instance when he fired one of his top engineers for providing an answer that Musk did not want to hear.
