mcmillandaly928967

p>Hackers are able to steal millions of Minecraft passwords

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p>29 April 2016

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p>Hackers have gained access to login information for more than seven million Minecraft users on the site Lifeboat.

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p>Lifeboat lets players run servers for customised, multiplayer maps for the smartphone version of Minecraft.

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p>Evidence suggests that stolen information, including email addresses and passwords is being offered by sites that sell hacker files.

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p>Research suggests that passwords were vulnerable to attack, and attackers could easily work them out.

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p>Minimise damage

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p>The information regarding the breach was shared with an independent security expert Troy Hunt who said he got the list from someone who deals in stolen credentials. Many people had told him the data was available on dark web sites.

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p>Mr. Hunt said the data was stolen in early 2016, but the breach has only just been made public.

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p>Passwords for Lifeboat accounts were washed however, he added, the algorithm used offered little security.

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p>Hashing is a method of encryption that encrypts passwords, making it difficult to read in the event that the password is lost.

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p>He said that a Google search for a hashed passcode will often give the correct plain text value. Popular cracking tools could automate and speed up this process, he said.

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p>"A large portion of these passwords could be reverted to plain text within a short amount of time," he said in a blog post about the breach.

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p>This often lead to other security issues, he said, because many people re-use passwords so the discovery of one password can lead attackers to compromise accounts on other sites. https://strongcraft.org/ </p>

p>Motherboard was supplied with a written statement from Lifeboat saying that it had taken the necessary steps to reduce the damage.

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p>"When this happened in early January we figured the best way to protect our users was to quietly make a password reset, without notifying the hackers that they had time to take action," it told the news site adding that it now used stronger hashing algorithms.

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p>It stated that it had not received any reports of anyone being hurt due to this.

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p>Mr. Hunt was critical about the company's policy of "quietly" forcing the reset of passwords. He claimed that this policy made him "speechless".

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p>He stated that Lifeboat could have been more proactive in notifying users to let them quickly change passwords in the event that they were used on other sites.

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p>"The first thing to be on the mind of every company following an incident like this is: 'How can we minimize the harm to our users?" He added.

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p>28 April 2016

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p>26 April 2016

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p>14 March 2016

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