Bitcoin enthusiasts face bigger problems than twitter scam

By Vildana Hajric

A Twitter hack this week featured Bitcoin in one of its most high-profile scams. But technical indicators suggest that could be just the start of problems for investors in the largest cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin fell as much as 1.9% in Thursday’s session to trade as low as $9,037 in New York -- just points away from testing the critical $9,000 support level. In addition, the GTI Vera Convergence Divergence Indicator, which measures up and down shifts, triggered a new sell signal, the first since early June, when the coin failed to breach $10,000.

“A break below $9,000 would raise a yellow warning flag on Bitcoin,” said Matt Maley, chief market strategist for Miller Tabak + Co. A subsequent drop below the mid-May low of $8,636 would signify a red flag, he said.

Bitcoin’s retreat follows news that Twitter accounts of some of the most prominent U.S. political and business leaders -- including Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffett -- were hacked Wednesday in an apparent effort to promote a scam involving the cryptocurrency.

You too can lose money to a Twitter hacker, and how!

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Grim Scenario

This time it was just a cryptocurrency scam. But what happens if hackers infiltrate Twitter again and take aim at financial markets? It’s easy to imagine a scenario where, instead of tweeting about Bitcoin, a hacked Elon Musk account plunges Tesla Inc.’s stock into a tailspin. It would only take a few seconds for a rogue @realDonaldTrump to send financial shockwaves around the world. (Authors: Abhishek Vishnoi, Anchalee Worrachate and Theo Golden)

The accounts sent out tweets promising to double the money of anyone sending funds via Bitcoin within 30 minutes, prompting the popular crypto exchange Coinbase Inc. to block its users from sending money to the address.

The hack duped people into sending at least $120,000 worth of Bitcoin to an anonymous online wallet, and more than half of that total has already been spirited to other accounts, Bloomberg News reported.

“Yesterday’s Twitter hack was a great reminder of how vulnerable cryptocurrency traders are to hacking incidents,” said Edward Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda. “Malicious activity has always been a concern for Bitcoin and those concerns are not going away anytime soon.”

To others, though, the event is another example of how blockchain technology -- the digital ledger that underpins cryptocurrencies -- could help bolster security for a company like Twitter. “Because of this technology, social media could undergo a major structural change to make this insecurity and impermanence, more permanent and tamper proof,” said Keld van Schreven, co-founder and managing director of KR1 Plc.