Hackers are now using Twitter to send coded update messages to computers they've previously infected with rogue code, according to a report from net-monitoring firm Arbor Networks.

This looks to be the first reported case of hackers using the popular micro-messaging company to control botnets, which are assemblages of infected PCs that can be directed to spy on their users, send spam, or attack web sites with fake traffic.

Arbor Network's Jose Nazario, an expert on botnets, discovered the so-called command-and-control structure. Infected computers were following the Twitter feed "Upd4t3" (now suspended) through its RSS feed.

"Basically, what it does is use the status messages to send out new links to contact, then these contain new commands or executables to download and run," Nazario wrote. "It’s an info-stealer operation."

The tweets turned out to be obfuscated links to sites where further malicious code and instructions could be downloaded.

Hackers have long used IRC chat rooms to control botnets, and have continually used clever technologies, such as peer-to-peer strategies, to counter efforts to track, disrupt and sometimes decapitate the bots.

Perhaps what's surprising then is that it's taken so long for hackers to take Twitter to the dark side.

There's something ironic about this finding, given that Russian hackers allegedly used a botnet to take Twitter down for two days last week. But we won't go down that rabbit hole.

Image courtesy Arbor Networks

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