Freecycle forumthat users to trade used products with each other, has confirmed a massive data breach that affected more than 7 million people.
The breach was discovered on Wednesday, with stolen data being listed for sale on hacking forums as early as May 30.The organization behind the forum warned users to change their passwords immediately.
The stolen information includes usernames, user IDs, email addresses, and MD5-hashed passwords.
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From screenshots shared by the malicious user who has put the stolen data up for sale, the credentials of Freecycle founder and CEO Deron Beal were stolen , giving the attacker full access to member information and forum posts.
“On August 30th, we were made aware of a data breach at Freecycle.org. As a result, we are advising all members to change their passwords as soon as possible,” Beal warned in a notice added to the homepage.
Those who use the same credentials in other services and accounts should change them immediately so that their other accounts are not compromised.
There are two ways to reset your Freecycle password:
- From your profile settings, scrolling down to the Password Reset section
- From the email password reset page
You should keep in mind that there may be some delay (up to an hour) during the password reset process via email, because the “Freecycle email system is very busy at the moment.”
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Freecycle says it reported the incident to the relevant authorities as soon as it was informed of the data breach.
“While most email do a good job of filtering spam, you may notice that you are receiving more spam than usual,” it warns users.
The organization recommends that users be cautious of the messages they receive (for phishing), avoid clicking on links in emails, and do not open file attachments (unless they are something they are expecting).
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Data breaches are a serious problem for modern digital communities, both for organizations and individuals. Breaches of data can be used by malicious actors to commit fraud and privacy violations. Users should be aware of the risks and take steps to protect their personal data, such as creating strong passwords, changing passwords regularly , and using different passwords for different services. It is also important to recognize the signs of fraud and report any suspicious activity to the relevant authorities.
Source: www.bleepingcomputer.com
