BBC reported that popular webmails Google’s Gmail, Yahoo, Microsoft’s Hotmail and AOL were targeted by a recent email scam. As a result, thousands of webmail users have their usernames and passwords posted online without their consent.
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The news firm had seen 2 list containing 30,000 names and passwords from email accounts posted online. Big G claimed that the illegal postage of webmail accounts was caused by “industry-wide phishing scheme”.
We recently became aware of an industry-wide phishing scheme through which hackers gained user credentials for web-based mail accounts including Gmail accounts
Phishing sites are fake and illegal websites set up to lure innocent web users. When users enter these malicious sites, confidential information such as email username, passwords, bank accounts, credit cards and other important info could be stolen.
Phishing scams can be seen on your email disguised as a normal message from your local bank. The user will be lured on a fake Phisher’s website where he/she will be asked to type bank details such as username, account number and passwords. (source: wikipedia)
Google further added that the illegal postage was not a “breach of security” but rather “a scam to get users to give away their personal information to hackers”. The search giant already implemented security and preventive measures on the affected accounts.
As soon as we learned of the attack, we forced password resets on the affected accounts. We will continue to force password resets on additional accounts when we become aware of them.
Web security analysts said that this is a “wake-up call” for big webmail providers to educate their users about widening influence of phishing scams.
Currently, affected accounts can still be accessed by its users. But of course, The harm was already done. Most probably, malicious hackers have already took advantage of these posted accounts. Amidst of these web mail exploitations, users (affected and unaffected) were informed to always change their email passwords and take precautionary measures to prevent similar email scams from happening in the future.
(source: BBC, Mashable)
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Tags: aol, compromised, gmail, google, Hotmail, illegal, Microsoft, Phishing attacks, Phishing sites, scams, web mail accounts, Yahoo, Yahoo mail
