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Niantic CEO John Hanke's Twitter account hacked

The hacker has made posts requesting that Pokemon Go be released in Brazil, and directing users to check their account security.

Michelle Starr Science editor
Michelle Starr is CNET's science editor, and she hopes to get you as enthralled with the wonders of the universe as she is. When she's not daydreaming about flying through space, she's daydreaming about bats.
Michelle Starr
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The latest victim in a long line of high-profile twitter attacks is the CEO of Pokemon Go developer Niantic, John Hanke. On July 31, a series of Tweets was posted to Hanke's 16,000 followers. They were hashtagged "OurMine" and claimed the hack was for Brazil, where Pokemon Go has yet to be released.

One tweet also claimed that Hanke's password was "nopass," but the Quora links to the hacker's explanations have been removed. Interestingly, OurMine is a company that claims to assess social network account security, so the hack seems like a marketing stunt, directing users to upgrade account security. Nevertheless, over on the hashtag, the stunt has gained a reaction, including people in Brazil who think the hack is a poor way to get a point across, and players in other countries who object to the recent update to the game.

Exactly how OurMine gained access to Hanke's password is unknown. The company did not immediately reply to a request for comment.