Categories: Technology

Massive security issues: The “Hive” app has to stop working unexpectedly

The startup’s servers would be shut down “for a few days,” it says. This after a warning from a German hacker collective.

The team behind the new social media app ‘Hive’ caused a sensation on Thursday with a drastic step: due to serious security problems, the servers will be completely shut down for a few days.

The announcement was made via Twitter – so via the online service that Hive wants to rip as many users as possible from.

«The Hive team has become aware of security issues affecting the stability of our application and the safety of our users. To resolve these issues, our servers will need to be temporarily offline for a few days while we resolve this for a better and more secure experience.”

German IT security researchers had previously warned:

“We currently strongly advise against using Hive Social.”

According to their own statements, the members of the hacker collective Zerforschung had discovered a number of critical vulnerabilities in Hive Social and reported them to the responsible US company. Contrary to their expectations, however, not all weaknesses have been eliminated.

A data meltdown is imminent: access to all data of all users

The reported vulnerabilities would allow attackers to access “all data” of all users. This applies to private messages, private messages, shared photos and videos, and even posts and messages that have already been “deleted”. In addition, access is also possible to e-mail addresses, telephone numbers and dates of birth specified during registration.

In a video published on their website, the security researchers also show that attackers can also manipulate or modify third-party messages.

“In order not to further compromise user privacy on Hive, we are not publishing technical details about the gaps for now.”

Not the first concern

In addition to the free Twitter alternative Mastodon, Hive Social has also benefited immensely from Elon Musk’s controversial management decisions in recent weeks. At the end of November, the start-up founded in 2019 by American student Raluca Pop reported one million users for the first time.

Shutting down the server is an unusual way to fix errors, to say the least, according to the well-known American tech blog Techcrunch. This move “raises questions about the development workflow in the company”.

“Isn’t there a development environment where the code is captured and then made available for release? How bad was the code that it had to be shut down completely to edit it again?”

These are not the first concerns raised in the weeks following the rapid growth. Hive Social was “not always completely transparent” “in terms of its inner workings, its corporate structure, its moderation skills or its funding sources”.

Sources

  • zerforschung.org: ZER Product Alert – Hive Social
  • techcrunch.com: Twitter alternative Hive is shutting down its app to fix critical security issues
  • newsweek.com: Meet the student behind Hive, the Twitter alternative challenging Elon Musk

(dsc)

Source: Watson

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