Twitter pages hit by hackers

Twitter pages hijacked by hackers.

From then President Elect Barack Obama to Britney Spears. It can happen to just about anyone.

Imposters send out fake tweets while followers hang on to every last word.

It's very serious. Just think about the damage to your reputation.

Twitter and Facebook. Both sites exploding because of their popularity.

Between those tweets and constant updates, you're opening up a whole new opportunity for thieves and hackers.

Social networking is all about sharing. It's how much information you choose to share that could make you a target for hackers

Most people don't think that bad things can happen to them revolving around social media.

Internet security experts like Robert Siciliano say social networking sites are like stepping stones for identity thieves.

Chances are nothing's gonna happen but there's still a chance people can use this information against you.

So you lock your profile, and set those settings to "private."

Sharing a little update about who you are or what you're doing may seem harmless, but think again.

Tom Oscherwitz is with ID Analytics. A company that helps consumers protect their online identities.

“The name of their pet, their favorite movie, the books that they like. This information while it's relevant to your friends it's also quite relevant to identity thieves, the same information many companies use to verify that you are who you say you are”

He says you need to treat Facebook and Twitter like secure accounts.

After all, just recently hackers broke into Twitter and forced the site to shut down. Facebook users also affected when the site slowed down.

If Twitter can get hacked that means you can get hacked.

There are all kinds of ways to break into accounts.

Hackers guess passwords or they hack into the site itself.

Those phishing scams are becoming more sophisticated, with emails customized directly to the user.

Michael Krigsman is the CEO of Asuret, a software and consulting company.

"If they figure out your password for Twitter well maybe you use the same password for Facebook. Once that happens it's a very small leap to learn much more about you who your friends are,where you live what kind of car you drive and so forth."

Experts say you need a good password something with numbers or characters and change it often.