Linus Media Group YouTube Channels Hacked

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here is the photo of the perpetrator per my source. LTT didn't stand a chance.

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DanNeely said:
Google does purge deleted youtube videos eventually. It takes several months for them to age out of backups, it can take longer than that period to recover an account that was hacked and used to host copyrighted movies for a few hours until being locked for getting zillion DMCA strikes. Hopefully cleaning up after crypto scammers won't take as long.
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Lmg should be responsible if they got social engineered or an employee got phished, dmca strikes are a big deal. Someone needs to be held accountable beyond the hackers
 
A good amount of the videos with "do not use" were downloaded and archived.

Will they be of any entertainment is yet to be seen. Seems like a really messy channel. Why keep all that stuff up?

Edit - Prevailing theory is somebody opened a pdf with an embedded script. Whoopsie.
 
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erek said:
I thought based on your sentiment of Linus being entertaining as can be that you’d had to of heard him discussing Floatplane
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I've only watched a handful of his videos. Haven't exactly been impressed with his technical ability in them, but he does have charisma which is what is more important for success than actual competency in show business.

Floatplane I had never heard of before.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
I've only watched a handful of his videos. Haven't exactly been impressed with his technical ability in them, but he does have charisma which is what is more important for success than actual competency in show business.

Floatplane I had never heard of before.
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Pretty much. Have high pitched, overly excitable voice and zoomer-tier thumbnails.

Gets all the clicks :D
 
erek said:
Latest update is that LMG is highly encouraging liking and subscribing to all their content on Floatplane now
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no they aren't, lol..
erek said:
No words

"Prior to being terminated—likely temporarily, given Linus Media Group is a YouTube partner with a solution on the way no doubt—for being automatically flagged as a result of violating YouTube community guidelines, the Linus Tech Tips channel re-uploaded many older videos, including some that had been marked as "do not publish." It is unclear to what extent Linus Sebastian and other members of LMG are currently aware of this crisis, but as of yet, no updates or statements have been made from the personal account of Linus or the main Linus Tech Tips Twitter account. The most recent Linus Tech Tips tweet is 13 hours old. This post will be updated as more details become available."

Source: https://www.techpowerup.com/306329/linus-media-group-youtube-channels-hacked
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"Regarding the YouTube channel hack, we are on top of it with Google's team now. Everything should be locked down and we are getting to the bottom of the attack vector with the (hopeful) goal of hardening their security around YouTube accounts and preventing this sort of thing from happening to anyone in the future.

You can expect a more detailed update on WAN Show at some point in the future. Not sure if it'll happen this week since this is still a developing situation.

The good news is that you can expect to get your LTT fix on Floatplane as usual :p



Linus"
 
I didn’t realize that Linus Tech Tips is treated much the same as Apple around here. I would have thought most of you would find his videos interesting since they cover a lot of off the wall stuff, not unlike this off the wall segue to this posts sponsor.
 
westrock2000 said:
I didn’t realize that Linus Tech Tips is treated much the same as Apple around here. I would have thought most of you would find his videos interesting since they cover a lot of off the wall stuff, not unlike this off the wall segue to this posts sponsor.
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he's mainstream so obviously people have to whine about him.
 
westrock2000 said:
I didn’t realize that Linus Tech Tips is treated much the same as Apple around here. I would have thought most of you would find his videos interesting since they cover a lot of off the wall stuff, not unlike this off the wall segue to this posts sponsor.
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LOL, I like LTT. I feel like a lot of the other tech channels dig into the minutiae of things while LTT's content is usually more real world. I don't need 25 minutes of testing only to tell me something is meaningless in the last 30 seconds of the video. Plus, I appreciate there is some level of humor to the LTT vids.
 
Well, Linus kinda jumped the shark to full comedy for me with the whole room water cooling videos. Though worst was his moderate wait and see takes then jump in and claim victory over Nvidia at the end with the whole Geforce Partnership Program stuff.
 
erek said:
No words

"Prior to being terminated—likely temporarily, given Linus Media Group is a YouTube partner with a solution on the way no doubt—for being automatically flagged as a result of violating YouTube community guidelines, the Linus Tech Tips channel re-uploaded many older videos, including some that had been marked as "do not publish." It is unclear to what extent Linus Sebastian and other members of LMG are currently aware of this crisis, but as of yet, no updates or statements have been made from the personal account of Linus or the main Linus Tech Tips Twitter account. The most recent Linus Tech Tips tweet is 13 hours old. This post will be updated as more details become available."

Source: https://www.techpowerup.com/306329/linus-media-group-youtube-channels-hacked
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leading theory is that it's from a fake sponsorship request and probably going to guess it was one of the newer sales team employee's.

"They are pretending to be a sponsor emailing that provides a brief to download, a demo of a game, a clip to watch, or any number of things, but it’s a .EXE file. The moment you open it, it takes a snapshot of the browser (the browser intercept), bypasses any 2FA. Then they have it automates to change your password, unlist all videos, and start rebranding and playing that scammy live stream."

they've been updating through the forums and floatplane but said they'll wait to say anything official until they know exactly what happened that way they can give detailed information so other creators know what to look out for. but this crap has been going on for a while(just look for all the spaceX and elon musk channels.
 
sirmonkey1985 said:
leading theory is that it's from a fake sponsorship request and probably going to guess it was one of the newer sales team employee's.

"They are pretending to be a sponsor emailing that provides a brief to download, a demo of a game, a clip to watch, or any number of things, but it’s a .EXE file. The moment you open it, it takes a snapshot of the browser (the browser intercept), bypasses any 2FA. Then they have it automates to change your password, unlist all videos, and start rebranding and playing that scammy live stream."

they've been updating through the forums and floatplane but said they'll wait to say anything official until they know exactly what happened that way they can give detailed information so other creators know what to look out for. but this crap has been going on for a while(just look for all the spaceX and elon musk channels.
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I doubt a sales guy especially a new one has access to their YouTube channel. Also if they actually got access to their network they could of done some serious damage and not just take down the YouTube channel.
 
vegeta535 said:
I doubt a sales guy especially a new one has access to their YouTube channel. Also if they actually got access to their network they could of done some serious damage and not just take down the YouTube channel.
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The goal wasn't to get the channel taken down. It was a crypto scam.
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Apparently how much the guy made before the channel got taken down.

*Edit* Some more made on the "Techquickie" channel:
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For those not in-the-know, Floatplane is LMG's venture into creating their own streaming platform, website, etc. So it's always been Plan B because, you know, YouTube isn't forever. The selection of the name Floatplane is not by accident, which Luke has made abundantly clear on The WAN Show over the years.

Anyone who follows The WAN Show or LMG channels intently should know about Floatplane already.
 
I do watch LTT sometimes. But, with all the crap about tech and security they have showed numerous times. It is a bad look that they got hacked. Basically someone got past the youtube 2fa from some PC or device that was unsecured. Sounds like his own company dont follow proper security measures they have produced videos on their channel lol.
 
Darunion said:
social engineering always finds a way past 2fa. Just need to sound like him over the phone and have enough details. Okay everyone begin your auditions for the next linus!
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He said not too long ago (Linus) he also got scammed out of money when building his house (?) or a deal going on with another company (?) where email chain was compromised and they got Linus to send money to the scammers or something IIRC

Linus Tech Tips isn't that Linus Tech Smart

vegeta535 said:
Don't forget the dumb stupid face image tag on the video!
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Gonna be something like:

❌💻✨HaXoReD!!1!!!!✨💻❌ 😱💻❌
 
Could be very much social hacking with nothing to do with an unsecure device or tech knowledge.

With AI able to manufacture a voice message that sound exactly with a coworker or boss if they have an online audio presence, those social hacking will be quite the trouble for a while, it will take us a little bit to react to the phone call of our bank that sound and react exactly like an human the way we do with an email that say it came from our bank, even more so if the human has the voice of someone we recognize and trust.
 
LukeTbk said:
Could be very much social hacking with nothing to do with an unsecure device or tech knowledge.
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Yeah but you wanna tech tips from someone without common sense?

LukeTbk said:
With AI able to manufacture a voice message that sound exactly with a coworker or boss if they have an online audio presence, those social hacking will be quite the trouble for a while, it will take us a little bit to react to the phone call of our bank that sound and react exactly like an human the way we do with an email that say it came from our bank, even more so if the human has the voice of someone we recognize and trust
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That's why whenever stuff like that happens you say "I'll call you back" and go find the actual number yourself online/in your own records and call that number back yourself
 
staknhalo said:
Yeah but you wanna tech tips from someone without common sense?
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Not sure how much it is still tech tips versus a show involving tech, like Bon Apetit was not much about actual recipe.

But if we talk tips about monitors, mouse, cpus for game, people possible to scam (or possible to employ someone that would be) with something well done (if it was), not a big issue at all, specially if the reasoning and the test setup is explained to me to judge. Sometime you just need to resource (time, people, hardware) to organize a 12 person blind test a new tech and they are sometime almost the only one to do it.

If I am a bank would a listen to LTT videos to build my infrastructure, not before any incident.
 
The Mad Atheist said:
Doesn't he have backup video just in case they're deleted?
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Or in case they want to use content from older video with full quality instead of starting with compressed youtube video.

They have backed video of them making backup, backing their own content-recovery issue is a large % of the channel.
 
Westwood said:
could probably switch to decaf, but overall seemed fine. /shrug
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I'm going to be honest. I have biases.

If he got rid of the stupid colorful hoodies and earrings, and stopped being a goof and hamming it up for the camera I probably would be less bothered by him.

That said, his seeming lack of technical knowledge is still quite disturbing form someone who does what he does.

He is definitely no Kyle. And no Anand Lal Shimpi, or even a Dr. Thomas Pabst. He has people who know their shit like them working for him, but personally I'd rather just cut out the middle man and hear it straight from the person who knows what the hell they are talking about. I don't need the pretty faced tech anchor.
 
I mean his educational background is in business he said IIRC so that's what he did - made a business - tech is really just the window dressing

Youtube knows I like tech so it's always trying to shove his videos down my throat, once in a blue moon I'll check his videos out of a product demo only desire - of course that doesn't help with the algos recommending less, but it is what it is, but dude really leans into that Youtube demo with his shrieking and loud emphasizing, mainly why I can't watch his stuff

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Wendell from L1 does all his stupid dumb corny jokes in a pretty calm voice/tone, no problem

Patrick from STH gets way too cheery, right off the bat sometimes, my only complaint about him lol
 
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Domingo said:
LOL, I like LTT. I feel like a lot of the other tech channels dig into the minutiae of things while LTT's content is usually more real world. I don't need 25 minutes of testing only to tell me something is meaningless in the last 30 seconds of the video. Plus, I appreciate there is some level of humor to the LTT vids.
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its like watching gamers nexus...where they complain about the silliest thing that almost no consumer would care about and then call it a bad product.
 
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