Yahoo! Closes Security Hole That Led To Breach 43
An anonymous reader writes "Yahoo! has patched the security hole that allowed hackers to access some 450,000 email addresses and passwords associated with Yahoo! Contributor Network and ultimately publish them last week. In the meantime, the group responsible for the hack of the official forum site of technology company NVIDIA has also dumped some user 800 records taken during the breach."
Re:Nothing is every secure (Score:4, Interesting)
Anyone however believes in 100% security will always be a victim of a hack
Pretty off topic in my opinion. Companies are not equal when it comes to security, far from it. Two major distinctions: the way the company was hacked (e.g. SQL injection), and how fast the company fixes the security concern(s). Sony for instance was a good (i.e. bad) example in both categories.
Re:Change password again (Score:4, Interesting)
So now that it's patched Yahoo users should change their passwords again. Presumably if your account was on "the list" and you changed your password after the first disclosure, your credentials could have been compromised again - prior to the security hole being closed.
While this may sound obvious, I bet many folks don't realize the distinction between a disclosure announcement and correction of the problem. Many people probably assume that when a massive password disclosure is made, that the problem has already been fixed. In this case apparently not.
What seems obvious, but which some people obviously don't realise, is that the vulnerable services were taken offline until they were fixed.
Their e-mail made no sense (Score:4, Interesting)
You may have read in press reports that Yahoo! recently confirmed an older file containing approximately 450,000 email addresses and passwords—provided by writers who had joined Associated Content prior to May 2010—was publicly posted on the Internet. This file was a standalone file that was not used to grant access to Yahoo! systems and services. This message is being sent to an email address in this compromised file.
We are taking important steps to address this issue and have now fixed the vulnerability that led to the disclosure of the data and enhanced our underlying security controls. As a non-Yahoo! account holder, we apologize that we cannot provide you a direct means to secure your account. We strongly recommend that you employ the security mechanisms recommended by your email service provider to secure your account.
Additionally, given the high frequency of consumers using the same login information on services across the Internet, we strongly advise users to:
Change their passwords for any account they hold every few months,
Use a different password for each service or website, and
Create passwords using a mixture of characters, symbols, and numbers.
We also suggest that you proactively monitor the activity on any account you have created online. Specifically, be on the lookout for spam originating from your email, and check your sign-in activity from time to time. If you see anything suspicious—like your account was accessed in Romania when you were home in Chicago—you should change your password immediately.
We take security very seriously at Yahoo! and invest heavily in protective measures to ensure the security of our users and their data across all our products. In addition, we will continue to take significant measures to protect our users and their data.
We sincerely apologize for this matter. Yahoo! Inc.