No need to panic,the Twitter Whale isn’t dead…yet.

While Twitter continues to be one of the 20 most visited websites online, the fact remains that Twitter has some serious security issues that need attention. Twitter’s major security issues are under further scrutiny after being hacked by an organization who calls themselves the “Iranian Cyber Army. ” While this was one of the largest malicious attacks on the popular social networking site, this wasn’t the first, nor will it be the last.

The Bank With No Security

The best way to understand the security situation that Twitter is currently dealing with is to compare it to a bank. Imagine that the bank you put your money in is the largest and most popular bank to do business. The catch though is that they have cops who carry pepper spray and have security cameras with no tapes. Does this sound familiar? It should because that is exactly what Twitter is going through.

For a site that is one of the top social networking sites in the world, one would expect security to be at the top of their list. Instead, attacks like those done by the “Iranian Cyber Army” continue to make users question if their information has already been leaked.

Bad Press For Twitter Means Good News For Facebook

Earlier this month, Facebook introduced their new privacy policies regarding Facebook user profiles. While this was met with some controversy, the fact remains that Facebook holds privacy and user security with extreme care.

On the flip side, bad press for Twitter only helps Facebook. Back in January when Twitter ‘celebs,’ like Barack Obama and Britney Spears, got their accounts hacked because of a loop hole in Twitters customer support tools, masses of users were put in a frenzy changing their passwords in the event that they would be deemed a Twitter ‘celeb.’

How Long Will We Put Up With It?

As mentioned earlier, if you consider Twitter to be a bank with little or no security, the question then becomes “how long before you stop going back?” Will it take another cyber attack on the Twitter main page? Or will it be when your own account gets taken over and used.

Aside from the back-end work that needs to be improved to prevent further attacks on the site, perhaps Twitter may also need to improve their front-end work as well. If you look at the current security measures that Twitter has in place for users to protect their privacy and security, aside from the ability to ‘lock’ your status updates and the ability to block individual users, there is not much more than that. In comparison, Facebook gives users almost complete access to their privacy and security, even going as far as allowing them to appear as if they never existed either on Facebook and to search engines.

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Computer programmer and key contributor to Mozilla and early versions of Netscape Navigator, Jamie Zawinski, once said:

If you give a hacker a new toy, the first thing he’ll do is take it apart to figure out how it works.

Right now that new toy is Twitter, and hackers are picking it apart.

Joseph is the Director of Marketing at Viralogy.com & works in social media & sports consulting. Read more about him at http://JosephAYi.com .

Tags: Fail Whale, Hackers, Security, Twitter