Yahoo Hacked - 200 Million Users Affected - Info Being Sold Online

Yahoo is poised to confirm a massive data breach of its service, according to several sources close to the situation, hacking that has exposed several hundred million user accounts.

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Earlier this summer, Yahoo said it was investigating a data breach in which hackers claimed to have access to 200 million user accounts and one was selling them online. “It’s as bad as that,” said one source. “Worse, really.”

The announcement, which is expected to come this week, also has possible larger implications for the $4.8 billion sale of Yahoo’s core business — which is at the core of this hack — to Verizon. The scale of the liability could bring untold headaches to the new owners. Shareholders are likely to worry that it could lead to an adjustment in the price of the transaction.

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But there’s nothing smooth about this hack, said sources, which became known in August when an infamous cybercriminal named “Peace” claimed on a website that he was selling credentials of 200 million Yahoo users from 2012 on the dark web for just over $1,800. The data allegedly included user names, easily decrypted passwords and personal information like birth dates and other email addresses.

Wow, this sucks. I've been a yahoo mail user for years. I'm not sure exactly how much data was stolen but hopefully it didn't include actual emails.

The hack took place from 2012; so if you haven't changed your password in the last 4 years, you probably should.

Apparently, yahoo knew about a breach in August but didn't inform users to change passwords.

Ghost

Edit: News Source

Oh wow!
They should have addressed it to their users.

I left Yahoo more than 15 years ago.

Where is this story coming from?

originally posted by: Macenroe82
Oh wow!
They should have addressed it to their users.

I left Yahoo more than 15 years ago.

CEO Marissa Mayer won't care as long as it doesn't effect her and her family.

Whenever a system liked this is hacked, it should really be the systems owners responsibility, any damage done to a user should be covered by the owner.

I'm sure I'll get a reply in support of the Mega Rich Corporation. "Should have read the Fine Print".

I used to use Yahoo mail as my main email for years because of switching ISPs and needing a steady email address. Now I've settled with one ISP and a couple of years ago I was having a lot of trouble with Yahoo. It wouldn't let me log in half the time. So, I switched everything important to my ISP email address. I haven't even logged into yahoo since. It's nothing but junk mail anyway. If anyone wants it, they can have it for all I care.

200 million accounts? That sounds like it's probably pretty much all of them.

a reply to: Sillyolme

One example:

Gizmodo

My old Yahoo e-mail account got hacked.

I didn't use it for a couple of years because I set up a Gmail account. I never closed the account.

The very next day family members started getting messages and oh one calls telling them to tell me to contact this number immediately. Telling my family that they were dispatching agents to my house to collect over due bills that I never had.

They even told me that they were dispating a agent. Lol.

I tried to get their number and address to report them, but it was all bogus.

a reply to: ghostrager

Well it's worse than they thought - 500 million users! And potentially state sponsored, though they would say that.

Bbc

Hackers stole information from about 500 million users from Yahoo, the company has confirmed. The breach occurred in late 2014 and included swathes of personal identifiable information, as well as “unencrypted security questions and answers”. It did not include any credit card data, the site said, adding it believed the attack was state-sponsored. In July, Yahoo was sold to US telecoms giant Verizon for $4.8bn (£3.7bn). It is not yet known if the breach will have an impact on that sale or its valuation.

a reply to: ghostrager

This is not a surprise to me!! I am this close to ditching Yahoo completely. Almost no one I know personally uses email anymore, first off, and second, they are frequently hacked. I added my own email address to my account, some time back, to be able to email photos from my phone to myself, instead of having to attack the phone via a cord. Sometime later, I noticed I had emails, that I[i/] had supposedly sent, which were spam. Irritated, I told people to ignore them, and started investigating. Checking the origin of the emails, I found, to my surprise, that they had originated from a YAHOO location overseas! As in, someone with Yahoo was hacking, and using accounts for spam! I informed them, and was told they "could not discuss" the issue. Never another word on the problem, from Yahoo. Between that, and their recent fiasco with the YM, they have lost all respect from me.