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  • AOL hit by massive data breach, Urges users to change their passwords

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    AOL hit by massive data breach

    The personal details of AOL’s millions of customers has been leaked in an attack on the company’s systems, resulting in thousands of accounts being hijacked to send spam.
    Internet pioneer AOL has warned of a major breach that has affected a significant number of users, leaking email and postal addresses, contact information and password details to attackers unknown.

    AOL launched in 1983 as the Control Video Corporation and produced a short-lived modem-based gaming download service for the Atari 2600 dubbed GameLine. The precursor to Valve’s Steam and similar digital distribution systems, GameLine was not a financial success; the company had better luck with the Link series of online portals for the Commodore 64, Apple II and Macintosh, and IBM compatibles. In 1989, America Online was born as a walled-garden internet service which included chat, email and several games – including the first-ever web-based interactive fiction series and the first automated play-by-email game.

    While internet-savvy consumers soon dropped AOL’s walled-garden system for more open services from generic internet service providers, the company still boasts a considerable client base. Despite an ongoing slide in customers, the company boasts a near three-million user count in the US alone – and it’s these customers who have been exposed in a serious security breach.

    ‘We have determined that there was unauthorised access to information regarding a significant number of user accounts,’ the company admitted late last night, following an investigation into spam messages sent from registered AOL accounts. ‘This information included AOL users’ email addresses, postal addresses, address book contact information, encrypted passwords and encrypted answers to security questions that we ask when a user resets his or her password, as well as certain employee information. We believe that spammers have used this contact information to send spoofed emails that appeared to come from roughly two per cent of our email accounts.’

    The company has not confirmed the nature of the ‘encryption’ used to store the passwords – which should, by industry best practice, be a salted one-way hash function, rather than reversible encryption – but does claim that it has ‘no indication’ that said encryption was broken; this despite the attackers gaining full access to the accounts from which spam is issuing, an indication that they have indeed been able to retrieve at least some passwords from the corpus.

    Users affected by the breach – and, at this point, it looks to cover anyone with an AOL email address, active or otherwise – is advised to reset their password and change their security questions; if the same password is used anywhere else, that should be changed too.

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  • Downdapp.com Pop-up Virus

    If you are seeing pop-up ads from Downdapp.com whenever you are opening a new tab within Internet Explorer, Firefox and Google Chrome, then your computer is infected with an adware or a potentially unwanted program.
    [Image: Downdapp.com pop-up virus]

    The Downdapp.com pop-up happens regardless of the web browser or search engine, and if you are seeing a pop-up from Downdapp.com asking you to update your browser or another piece of software, then your computer may be infected with adware or a potentially unwanted program.
    This infection is designed specifically to make money. It generates web traffic, collects sales leads for other dubious sites, and will display advertisements and sponsored links within your web browser.
    Downdapp.com is not a malicious domain itself, however cyber criminals are using malicious products to display ads from this domain, and thus getting pay-per-click revenue.

    The Downdapp.com ads are caused by an ad-supported (users may see additional banner, search, pop-up, pop-under, interstitial and in-text link advertisements) cross web browser plugin for Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome, which is distributed through various monetization platforms during installation. This malicious browser extensions is typically added when you install another free software (video recording/streaming, download-managers or PDF creators) that had bundled into their installation this adware program.
    When installed this adware program will open a Downdapp.com pop-up box stating that you need to updated your flash player or install an update for another software. If you click on the “Download” or “Click to install now” button, instead of installing an update for your browser, you’ll agree to download adware and other malicious programs onto your computer. The Downdapp.com malicious programs may install on your computer: toolbars (Babylon Toolbar, Delta Toolbar), adware (Yontoo, DealPly, CouponBuddy) or other forms of malware.

    This infection will also display advertising banners on the webpages that you are visiting, and as you browse Internet, it will show coupons and other deals available on different websites.

    You should always pay attention when installing software because often, a software installer includes optional installs, such as this Downdapp.com pop-up ads. Be very careful what you agree to install.
    Always opt for the custom installation and deselect anything that is not familiar, especially optional software that you never wanted to download and install in the first place. It goes without saying that you should not install software that you don’t trust.

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