Circles Tech: Google Plus

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More than 2 million accounts have been compromised from popular sites such as Google, Yahoo, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn after malware captured login credentials from users worldwide, according to a new report.<br />
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 See also: <a href="http://www.circlestech.com/2013/12/about-new-iwork-with-update-brings-back.html" target="_blank">About the New iWork With Update Brings Back Lost Features</a></h4>
According to web security firm <a href="http://blog.spiderlabs.com/2013/12/look-what-i-found-moar-pony.html" target="_blank">Trustwave</a>,
 hackers have stolen login usernames and passwords across various sites 
in the past month with the help of Pony malware, a bit different than a 
typical breach.<br />
"Although these are accounts for online services such as Facebook, 
LinkedIn, Twitter and Google, this is not the result of any weakness in 
those companies networks," said Abby Ross, a spokesperson for Trustwave.
 "Individual users had the malware installed on their machines and had 
their passwords stolen.<br />
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<a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" name="pony-steals-passwords-that"></a>

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<blockquote class="microcontent-wrapper pullquote">
<div class="microcontent-shares" data-description="Pony steals passwords that are stored on the infected users' computers" data-fragment="pony-steals-passwords-that" data-url="">
</div>
<span class="microcontent" data-description="Pony steals passwords that are stored on the infected users' computers" data-fragment="pony-steals-passwords-that" data-micro="1">Pony steals passwords that are stored on the infected users' computers</span>
</blockquote>
<span class="microcontent" data-description="Pony steals passwords that are stored on the infected users' computers" data-fragment="pony-steals-passwords-that" data-micro="1">Pony steals passwords that are stored on the infected users' computers</span> as well as by capturing them when they are used to log into web services."
Although the culprit behind the hack remains unknown, Trustwave wrote
 on its blog that two targets were Russian-speaking social networking 
sites (vk.com and odnoklassniki.ru), which could hint at the virus' 
origin. <br />
"The malware was configured so that the majority of the credential 
information was sent to a server in the Netherlands," Ross said. "The 
server does not show from which countries the information came from so 
we cannot break down exactly how many users from each country were 
affected. However, we can confirm the attackers targeted users worldwide
 including in the U.S., Germany, Singapore, Thailand and others."<br />
It's also important to note that the stolen credentials were never 
publicly posted online. Trustwave researchers were able to access a 
command and control server used by the Pony botnet and recovered the 
passwords from there. <br />
"We have reached out to the major service providers affected and they
 are taking steps to inform their users or remediate the compromised 
accounts," Ross told <i>Circles tech</i>.<br />
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Facebook accounted for about 57% of the compromised accounts, followed by Yahoo (10%), Google (9%) and Twitter (3%). <br />
A Facebook spokesperson told <i>Circles tech</i> the company has already reached out to those with compromised accounts. <br />
"While details of this case are not yet clear, it appears that 
people’s computers may have been attacked by hackers using malware to 
scrape information directly from their web browsers," a Facebook 
spokesperson told <i>Circles tech</i>. <a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" name="as-a-precaution-weve"></a>
<br />
<blockquote class="microcontent-wrapper pullquote">
<div class="microcontent-shares" data-description=""As a precaution, we've initiated a password reset for people whose passwords were exposed."" data-fragment="as-a-precaution-weve" data-url="">
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<span class="microcontent" data-description=""As a precaution, we've initiated a password reset for people whose passwords were exposed."" data-fragment="as-a-precaution-weve" data-micro="1">"As a precaution, we've initiated a password reset for people whose passwords were exposed."</span>
</blockquote>
<span class="microcontent" data-description=""As a precaution, we've initiated a password reset for people whose passwords were exposed."" data-fragment="as-a-precaution-weve" data-micro="1">"As a precaution, we've initiated a password reset for people whose passwords were exposed."</span>
Facebook added that its users can protect themselves when using the 
site by activating login approvals and login notifications in their 
security settings.  <br />
"[These users] will be notified when anyone tries to access their 
account from an unrecognized browser and new logins will require a 
unique passcode generated on their mobile phone," the spokesperson said.<br />
The company also discovered most of the compromised passwords were considered "weak."<br />
"In our analysis, passwords that use all four character types and are
 longer than 8 characters are considered 'excellent,' whereas passwords 
with four or less characters of only one type are considered 
'terrible,'" Trustwave wrote on its blog. "Unfortunately, there were 
more terrible passwords than excellent ones, more bad passwords than 
good, and the majority, as usual, is somewhere in between in the medium 
category."<br />
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