A young man has gone viral after seemingly hacking into the TikTok account of the fashion label Marc Jacobs. The sneaky chap appears in an eight-second video on the account, humorously announcing how he achieved such an unlikely feat.
The video’s annotations recite word-for-word what he says in it. The on-screen text is as follows: “FUN FACT. The password to the Marc Jacobs TikTok account is MarcJacobs123.” In the video’s description, the caption reads, “Fun fact,” followed by a link to the TikTok account of a user called @Slopsta, which belongs to the culprit.
The password is like something a pre-teen would have on their social media accounts — their own name followed by “123” — so it’s pretty staggering that such a high-profile brand would be so lax with their account security. It garnered a significant response from users of TikTok, some of whom weren’t convinced the scenario was all it appeared to be.
How did TikTok react?
One user wrote, “I don’t think y’all are getting the joke,” before explaining to others what he meant by that. The user in question said of @Slopsta, “he has his own account we’re he posts fun and disturbing facts, this happens to be posted on the marc Jacobs account which is not his own.” There’s no obvious evidence that that’s true, but it’s one possible explanation.
Some users were taken aback after realizing which account the video was posted on. They wrote things like, “took me a minute to realise that this was posted on the Marc Jacobs account,” and “LOL IT TOOK ME A MINUTE TO REALISE.”
Someone else suggested the video may have been a clever way to promote the brand with their comment, which read, “If this is just a marketing ploy, it’s working.”
Others simply enjoyed the video and refused to look deeper into it for any explanations. Comments of that nature included, “This is, hands down, my favorite tik tok that has ever come across my fyp,” “This is indeed the funnest fact,” “this is so funny,” Awesome thanks,” and “This is the funnest fact.”
Meanwhile, one user who works as a social media manager suggested such lazy security measures are commonplace in the business world, writing, “As a social manager, you’d be surprised how often this happens for most socials.” Another user, called “Mark Jokobs”, humorously commented, “I got scared for a sec,” while another persona said of @Slopsta, “who is this diva.”
As many users who attempted to log into it pointed out in their comments, the administrators behind the Marc Jacobs account appear to have cottoned on to the situation and have now changed the password. They have, however, opted to leave the video up (for now, at least).
According to trend-spotting company Exploding Topics, 30% of internet users have experienced a data breach due to a weak password. Let that statistic and the above video be a lesson to you all. There’s a reason you’re warned that your password is weak during signup processes, and there’s a reason it’s often suggested to use a mix of uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters. Don’t be like Marc Jacobs!
Published: Nov 15, 2024 05:16 am