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Twitter breach bigger than originally thought

Cyber crooks managed to compromise the online security of high-profile micro-blogging site Twitter's users raising even bigger concerns over internet security, it has emerged.

Twitter admitted on Monday in a blog post that its systems had been breached by a hacker who managed to compromise 33 accounts after gaining access to tools used by its support team.

"We considered this a very serious breach of security and immediately took the support tools offline. We'll put them back only when they're safe and secure," wrote Twitter co-founder Biz Stone.

It has now emerged that high profile members of the site including forthcoming US president Barack Obama, Britney Spears, a CNN anchor and even the Fox News' Twitter were all compromised.

According to Graham Cluley of internet security firm Sophos, this attack "is actually much more serious than these people and organisations falling for a simple phishing attack".

"This shocking start to the year for Twitter should send a stark warning to any online company holding details of its users that it needs to make certain it has proper security in place to prevent illegitimate access," he said.

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