Last week, Twitter was hit by a major Bitcoin scam where hackers took control of various verified accounts to run Bitcoin scams. While Twitter dismissed the attack as social engineering, the company has been running its own investigation to get to the bottom of the hack. Meanwhile, over at YouTube, hackers have been taking over major YouTube channels to run Bitcoin streams asking people to send Bitcoins into their accounts.
Now, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has filed a lawsuit against YouTube. Wozniak’s lawyers noted that the scammers were using his name and likeness to trick people into sending money. Steve Wozniak’s lawsuit was joined by 17 other victims of the Bitcoin scam who want YouTube to take immediate action and take down scam videos. In a statement provided to Bloomberg, YouTube noted that these scams go against its policies and the company is working on removing them from the platform. YouTube has removed more than 6 million videos during the first quarter and cancelled almost 2 million accounts for violating its policies.
Interestingly, the lawsuit praises Twitter for its swift action against these scammers last week.
That same day, Twitter acted swiftly and decisively to shut down these accounts and to protect its users from the scam. In stark contrast, for months now, Defendant YouTube has been unapologetically hosting, promoting, and directly profiting from similar scams. YouTube has featured a steady stream of scam videos and promotions that falsely use images and videos of Plaintiff Steve Wozniak, and other famous tech entrepreneurs. (via CoinDesk)
You can head to Scribd to check out the full copy of the lawsuit.