I had a
rare Twitter username, @N. Yep, just one letter. I’ve been offered as
much as $50,000 for it. People have tried to steal it. Password reset
instructions are a regular sight in my email inbox. As of today, I no
longer control @N. I was extorted into giving it up.
While
eating lunch on January 20, 2014, I received a text message from PayPal
for one-time validation code. Somebody was trying to steal my PayPal
account. I ignored it and continued eating.
Later
in the day, I checked my email which uses my personal domain name
(registered with GoDaddy) through Google Apps. I found the last message I
had received was from GoDaddy with the subject “Account Settings Change
Confirmation.” There was a good reason why that was the last one.
From: <support@godaddy.com> GoDaddy
To: <*****@*****.***> Naoki Hiroshima
Date: Mon, 20 Jan 2014 12:50:02 -0800
Subject: Account Settings Change Confirmation
Dear naoki hiroshima,
You are receiving this email because the Account Settings were modified for the following Customer Account:
XXXXXXXX
There will be a brief period before this request takes effect.
If these modifications were made without your consent, please log in to your account and update your security settings.
If
you are unable to log in to your account or if unauthorized changes
have been made to domain names associated with the account, please
contact our customer support team for assistance: support@godaddy.com or
(480) 505-8877.
Please note that Accounts are subject to our Universal Terms of Service.
Sincerely,
GoDaddy
I
tried to log in to my GoDaddy account, but it didn’t work. I called
GoDaddy and explained the situation. The representative asked me the
last 6 digits of my credit card number as a method of verification. This
didn’t work because the credit card information had already been
changed by an attacker. In fact, all of my information had been changed.
I had no way to prove I was the real owner of the domain name.
The
GoDaddy representative suggested that I fill out a case report on
GoDaddy’s website using my government identification. I did that and was
told a response could take up to 48 hours. I expected that this would
be sufficient to prove my identity and ownership of the account.
Click on the link below to read the full story:
https://medium.com/@N/how-i-lost-my-50-000-twitter-username-24eb09e026dd
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