In a recent online post, LeakedSource, a collaboration of data found online in the form of a search engine, has stated that Twitter credentials are being traded in the tens of millions on the dark web.

A user going by the alias Tessa88 provided the data set to the platform that contains over 32.8 million records – stolen passwords from Twitter accounts.

“We have very strong evidence that Twitter was not hacked, rather the consumer was. These credentials however are real and valid. Out of 15 users we asked, all 15 verified their passwords”, LeakedSource said.

It explained that millions of people have become infected by malware, which sent every saved username and password from browsers like Chrome and Firefox back to the hackers from all websites including Twitter.

“Passwords were stolen directly from consumers, therefore they are in plaintext with no encryption or hashing. Remember that Twitter probably doesn't store the passwords in plaintext, Chrome and Firefox did”, it added.

According to ZDNet, Tessa88 is a Russian seller, who is selling the records for 10 bitcoins, or about $5,730 at the time of writing.

In response to this news, a Twitter spokesperson issued a statement saying:

"We are confident that these usernames and credentials were not obtained by a Twitter data breach -- our systems have not been breached. In fact, we've been working to help keep accounts protected by checking our data against what's been shared from recent other password leaks."

Michael Coates, Twitter’s trust and information security officer, said in a tweet that Twitter has investigated the matter and is confident that its systems have not been breached. He added: