No one has ever accused politicians of being the most technically savvy, but this one takes the cake.
Rep. Mo Brooks, a Republican congressman from Alabama, accidentally shared what appears to be his Gmail password or username and an unidentified PIN number with the world on Twitter on Sunday afternoon. Mashable has blurred the PIN and added the red arrow to the photo below.
A screenshot of the since-deleted tweet from Rep. Mo Brooks containing sensitive information. Mashable has blurred the PIN.
Image: screenshot: Twitter
How this happened is even more ridiculous.
On Sunday, the congressman tweeted that he was served with a lawsuit from Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell of California. Swalwell and his legal team has been attempting to serve the Republican with the suit related to Brooks’ role in the violent storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6 by Trump supporters.
Brooks has gone out of his way to avoid receiving the legal documents. The lawsuit alleges that Brooks — along with former President Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and others — incited the riot, aided the rioters, and broke laws such as the anti-terrorism act.
According to Brooks, his wife was served with the papers over the weekend. He claims the process in which she was served was illegal.
In order to prove this, he pulled up a list of laws on the Alabama legislature’s website. Brooks wanted to share a screenshot of the page with his followers. However, perhaps because he wasn’t sure how to take a screenshot on his computer, Brooks took a photo of his laptop screen using an iPad and tweeted it out.
Unfortunately for him, the photo of his laptop screen included a note taped to his screen on which you can clearly see an assortment of letters and numbers labeled “PIN” and the phrase “momar5456” labeled “Gmail.”
It should be noted that Rep. Brooks sits on the House Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems (CITI). This subcommittee has jurisdiction over the Defense Department’s policies on technology, software, and cybersecurity.
It’s unclear whether the sensitive information that appeared in Rep. Brooks’ screenshot is current.
However, a quick Google search for “momar5456” pulls up an email address connected to Rep. Brooks and social media usernames connected to the politician’s wife, Martha Brooks.
It’s also possible that “momar5456” is a Gmail address that the congressman and/or his wife uses. A check for the username on Gmail shows that it’s unavailable to register.
For example, here is Martha’s Pinterest account, where she uses the username “momar5456.” Rep. Brooks has also used the email address momar5456@yahoo.com when filing to run for Congress with the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
The tweet from Rep. Brooks was still live on Twitter up until Monday afternoon. A followup tweet from Brooks that cropped out the sensitive data in the photo is still on Twitter. The text in the tweet is exactly the same as the deleted one, except for an added period in front of Rep. Swalwell’s Twitter handle so it would show on users’ feeds instead of as a reply.
.@EricSwalwell Well, Swalwell FINALLY did his job, served complaint (on my WIFE).
HORRIBLE Swalwell’s team committed a CRIME by unlawfully sneaking INTO MY HOUSE & accosting my wife!
Alabama Code 13A-7-2: 1st degree criminal trespass. Year in jail. $6000 fine.
More to come! pic.twitter.com/XSrFnezDlC
— Mo Brooks (@RepMoBrooks) June 6, 2021
Rep. Brooks has provided a few valuable lessons here, though.
You should know how to properly take a screenshot. You should be aware of what information is present in any photos you share online. And, finally, you should never use your wife’s Pinterest username as a password.
WATCH: How to concoct (and remember!) an insanely secure password
