The Entirety of Twitch Has Reportedly Been Leaked
This month an anonymous hacker has leaked the entirety of the Twitch platform including source code, user payout information, and encrypted passwords. VGC (Video Games Chronicle) dug deeper and has verified the mentioned 125 GB torrent link posted to 4chan was indeed Twitch and users’ private data.
A Twitch representative confirmed that a breach has taken place, telling VGC that their teams are “working with urgency to understand the extent of this. We will update the community as soon as additional information is available. Thank you for bearing with us.”
According to VGC the Twitch breach includes:
- The entire source code of the platform, including historical iterations going back to its founding
- 2019 creator payout reports
- Names of mobile, desktop and console Twitch clients
- Proprietary SDKs and internal AWS services used by Twitch
- Names of every property Twitch owns, such as IGDB and CurseForge
- Unreleased products intended to compete against Steam and Amazon Game Studios
- Tools used by Twitch staff to improve their platform security
FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice About Fake Reviews and Other Misleading Endorsements
On October 13th, the FTC issued a Notice of Penalty to 700 companies representing top advertisers, leading retailers, top consumer product companies, and major advertising agencies. The Notice of Penalty aimed to deter any entity from wrongfully using endorsements to deceive consumers. Some examples from prior FTC rulings include misrepresenting whether an endorser is an actual, current, or recent user of a product or service and misrepresenting the experiences by the endorser, if those experiences do not reflect what a consumer could typically expect with the same product or service.
It appears that the FTC is taking aim at some practices that have been adopted by brands and agencies on social media, such as using paid influencers, brand endorsements, exaggerated product reviews and/or product video demonstrations in exchange for free products or compensation. Advertising efforts on social media have certainly muddied the waters and made it harder to separate authentic content and reviews from promotional content that is disguised as trustworthy information coming from a favorite online personality.
Instagram Adds Reels Ads into Its Marketing API
Instagram Reels was launched earlier this year as a response to the growing interest in short-form video content popularized by TikTok. Now that the Reels format has gained traction and appears to be here to stay, Facebook is now including the Reels ad placement in its marketing API, allowing third-party platforms to create and deliver Reels ads from their own platforms that will display alongside relevant Reels videos. This update is coming just in time for the holiday season and will give brands more opportunities to experiment with their advertising and placements.