Twitter's source code was leaked on GitHub !

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Twitter believes the code leaker is an ex-employee, but that doesn’t really help to focus the investigation.

Headquarters in San Francisco | Source code leak on GitHub

Twitter’s source code was recently found on GitHub. Twitter is attempting to compel GitHub to reveal the person who posted the code.

GitHub disabled the repository on Thursday night. Shortly after Twitter filed a DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) takedown notice. It appears that the information sought by Twitter has not been provided. The code submitter’s contact details, IP addresses, and any session information. Associated logs linked to this repo or any forks. According to Twitter’s DMCA takedown notice. were all requested by GitHub.

The GitHub user who uploaded the Twitter source code goes by the grip “FreeSpeechEnthusiast,” which might be a reference to Twitter CEO Elon Musk portraying himself as a defender of free speech.

According to the New York Times, “it was unclear how long the leaked code had been online. it appeared to have been public for at least several months.” Despite that, the NYT article said Twitter “ceos were only recently made aware of the source code leak.”

According to the profile of GitHub user FreeSpeechEnthusiast. the user joined GitHub on January 3, 2023, and made its only code filing on the same day. The code was described as “proprietary source code for Twitter’s platform and internal tools” in Twitter’s DMCA notice to GitHub.

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Thousands of ex-employees could be on the suspect list

The leaker could have been one of the approximately 5,500 Twitter employee. who were laid off, fired, or resigned after Musk purchased the company. Twitter reportedly laid off approximately 5,000 contractors shortly after Musk’s acquisition. However, many staff members evidently did not have access to the specific source code that was leaked.

Twitter seeks “all identifying information”

Twitter’s stated subpoena requests “all recognizing information, along with the user(s) linked to the following GitHub username: FreeSpeechEnthusiast,” which include “name(s), address(es), telephone number(s), email address(es), social media profile data, and IP address(es).” It also requests “all identifying information provided when this account was established. As well as all resulting defining information provided for billing or administrative reasons.”

The subpoena request also seeks any “users who posted, uploaded, downloaded, or modified the data” at the repository where the Twitter source code was posted.