If you received an ominous message from Twitter telling you to reset your password, don't be alarmed. Despite what the message says, your account probably wasn't hacked.

The confusion began when Twitter on Monday evening locked a number of users out of their accounts. The microblogging service then sent an email to users asking them to reset their passwords.

"Twitter believes that your account may have been compromised by a website or service not associated with Twitter. We've reset your password to prevent accessing your account," the email stated.

But as it turns out, the problem wasn't malicious hackers. It was actually an internal error.

"We unintentionally sent some password reset notices tonight due to a system error. We apologize to the affected users for the inconvenience," a Twitter spokesman said in a statement to PCMag.

The problem affected "far less" than 1 percent of Twitter users, according to Re/code. Those affected will still need to update their password information to regain access to their accounts.

Though this was just a false alarm, Twitter has suffered legitimate breaches in the past. Last year, the company disclosed that it had identified multiple access attempts by unauthorized individuals. Further investigation revealed that the unidentified attackers were able to access usernames, email addresses, session tokens, and encrypted/salted passwords, belonging to approximately 250,000 users.

Twitter users were also forced to change their passwords back in Nov. 2012 amidst concerns over hacked accounts. But much like the latest snafu, in that instance, many of the reset emails were sent to users who were never in danger of having their accounts compromised.

Further Reading

Web Hosting Reviews