Absolutely everything on this blog that surrounds the term “hacking” is meant for training and educational purposes only. WE DO NOT ENGAGE IN NOR PROMOTE ANY ILLEGAL HACKING ACTIVITY!

It’s not very often that we get followed by a well-known celebrity’s account on Twitter. Whoops, I mean X. However, when it does happen we usually tend to toot our horn a little bit. It’s kind of our way of giving thanks while touting bragging rights simultaneously.

I woke up…
to see that Sheryl U
done followed a brother,
But who
can’t see no reason
we would choose
to follow each other?

Hmm’, a celebrity follower. ↑

The interesting thing in this particular case was that the celebrity account followed @greyhatdev and my personal account @star_hack3r.

It’s quite naturally expected that, given we’re doing things worthy and adding value to the community or to the world, our company account would have one or two celebrity accounts following us but I thought, “What’s with the personal account also catching one?”

(Actually, the irony here is that at the moment, the personal account does have more celebrity followers than the company account has.)

But since we’re both the same color, 
We doubt cause we’re black,
If I didn’t know any better, 
I’d bet your account has been hacked.

So before jumping the gun and getting all excited about being followed by another celebrity account, I decided to do a little digging.

I had questions, like, “Could this celebrity account be a parody or sock puppet…. Or maybe even a catfish? 🤔 (See Nice Reads at the end of this article for more information on the different flavors of alternative accounts.)

So I figured I’d poke the bear and send out a reply and to my surprise, it wasn’t long before the celebrity account replied with a RT … .to all of its 1.3M followers.

Let’s see, here’s a celebrity account with 1.3M followers that’s also following 1.3M accounts. (Of course those numbers may have since changed.)

And that’s when things got interesting…..

Why don’t we back up for a minute,
Let’s stick to the subject,
This isn’t F-U-D
I spit out to the public,
this wasn’t…

what it appears like
on the surface,
deserves a discussion,
Don’t take my word,
Go Table-Top it,
Mitigate the destruction

It’s repercussions,
Here on X cause half these follows
Be bots,
That’s why most hackers,
Chose to follow those
Who prove that they not.

To be confused…..
With Nation States
that act for the clues,
Who think they’re hacking
For they’ fate
but really hack for Lulz.

It’s cruel!

Tik-Tok increased the limit,
15 minute for reels,
So,
that hand you thought
They lent it
won’t get seen when it deals….

Now, I don’t want to sound like some kind of paranoid hacker who’s been engulfed by all things Cybersecurity for far too long. I’m just saying- “Just because you pour syrup on something, that doesn’t make it pancakes.” I know, What the heck does that even supposed to mean? 

Well, what it means is just because an account has a Blue Badge next to it, that doesn’t tell us jack-diddly-squat about its authenticity. It’s a known fact that practically anyone can attain that shiny verification Blue Badge these days. My Point?

My point is that we must remain diligent with our OSINT when engaging with accounts on not only X, but all social media platforms!

And judging by the look of things, when I visited the account’s timeline it appeared that I wasn’t the only one tooting my horn about being followed by Sheryl Underwood.

Mrs. Underwood 
If I misunderstood you
My para-noy-ya,
Begs me not to
Hit retweet but rather
call on ah’ lawyer. 

Or Diane Sawyer,
To verify this is your account….
And if she can’t,
Then Elon Musk

You must get it down.

Which leads us to deduce that either 1.7M horn tooters got followed by Sheryl Underwood or 1.7M of us just got duped by an imposter. (imposter sounds so much better when you say it in espanol.)

Looking over the results of our preliminary OSINT efforts, the evidence thus far does indicate that this may actually be a legitimate account of Sheryl Underwood.

Now. Does this make us more special than anyone else? No, of course it doesn’t.

As we stated in the beginning of the article- we’d like to hope and believe that not only a celebrity but “anyone” who follows Grey Hat Developer related accounts chose to do so because in their eyes, we’re recognized as an entity that is manifesting value into the universe, that’s all.

In conclusion, if this is follow turns out to be legit we’re tooting our horn here because we are absolutely honored and humbled by the gesture!

That being said, we’d love to prove it’s legitimacy beyond the shadow of a doubt.

But for that to happen we reckon we’d need somewhat of a direct response from her, or at the least an official member of her team to verify that the follow is legit sooooo…DRUM ROLL,

“Will the real Sheryl Underwood please stand up?” – in our best Slim Shady voice.

Well, that does it for now. If you’ve made it this far we thank you very much. Please subscribe to stay in the loop and not miss out on any of our freshly poetically-waxed hacking specific content and by all means share this far and wide.

Always remember….You are absolutely awesome here.

Hack On, Ladz and Gentz! 

Parody accounts in the news.  – NBC News

Excellent post on Sock Puppet accounts – Medium

Great post discussing Catfish Accounts – Medium