- Wednesday, 10 February 2010
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The problem with political jokes is they get elected - Henry Cote
Hotmail suffers massive data theft
A MASSIVE phishing operation is being blamed for the theft of thousands of login credentials on Microsoft's Hotmail service.
The company said that over the weekend reports emerged of a mass password theft. After investigating the reports, Microsoft said that it had traced the thefts back to a phishing page which gathered user data and that no internal systems at Microsoft had been compromised.
Microsoft news site Neowin.net reported early Monday that user names and passwords for more than 10,000 accounts had been posted on code-sharing service pastebin. The site reported that the majority of the compromised accounts were believed to be from Europe.
Microsoft is advising users whose credentials may have been compromised to immediately change their passwords. Users are also encouraged to change their password recovery questions and update their alternate email addresses.
Both Microsoft and third party security groups have long suggested that users make efforts to avoid phishing attacks by carefully checking the URL and content of pages which ask for login information and avoiding providing any information to untrusted parties or suspicious pages.
Though some reports have indicated that phishing activity is down slightly in recent months, experts predict that activity will climb as the holiday season draws nearer. µ
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So - this was a mass phishing exercise, directed purely at Hotmail accounts? Why would anyone even do that? Is there evidence that Hotmail users are especially stupid or credulous?
Well, I suppose if Microsoft runs Hotmail, and the users think that's the best service they can find...
This phising thing also affected Gmail, Aol and some others which I can't remember right now -I'm too lazy to look it up-
It seems that stupid users are more or less evenly distributed after all.
microsoft is the main target for all kinds of malware so the people who use their products are just asking for it
they may as well have a tattoo on their forehead saying "MUG" or "SCAM FODDER"
I had my Hotmail account hacked a few years ago, and the hackers used it to access my eBay account. Microsoft support were totally useless, mindless droids parroting a script, they refused to accept any sort of proof that I was the owner trying to get access. Their best advice was "open a new account".
By contrast, eBay were very helpful and quickly restored my account, and cleaned up the mess caused by the hackers.
Of course, any online accounts are vulnerable, but I want to know there is support available should this happen, and Microsoft were appalling. I wouldn't touch Hotmail/Windows Live with a bargepole.
Hotmail suffers massive data theft
How is this a theft from Hotmail? It is theft of individual usernames and passwords from user's PCs. Nobody has hacked Hotmail and, as far as I can see, Microsoft have done nothing wrong here, but the headline suggests a security breach of hotmail.
Bad reporting
@ RW,
did you even read the article? it says clearly that microsoft's systems had not been compromised....
so read more than just the headline before saying "bad reporting..."
Its now believed to be key logging as the cause.