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June is upon us and with it comes some of life’s sweet little pleasures – lazy summer vacations, long, hot, sticky days and apparently mega-huge database hacks. Yup, you read that right. It sure would have been nice to say that the early summer months mean sharing your double dip ice cream come with your dog, but sorry Rex, not this year.  
In 2016, so far June is sizing up to be the month of the database hack.  
Just how many websites have had their databases hacked and seen their user’s passwords and login credentials leaked on to the dark web as of the end of May?  
Well, let’s count and see.  
**LinkedIn** – First there was the LinkedIn data dump [we told you about a few weeks ago](https://blog.reasoncoresecurity.com/2016/05/24/have-you-been-pwned-in-the-linkedin-data-dump-here-is-how-to-tell/), in which 165 million emails and passwords were hacked. The hack itself took place in 2012 but the information from the dump just surfaced on the dark web in May, prompting LinkedIn to reset passwords and alert their users to potential security issues. The whole dump is being offered for sale by a grey hat hacker using the name “Peace” on the dark web forum “The Real Deal” for the bargain price of $2200.  
**Tumblr** – Then just a few days after that, Tumblr, the microblogging/social media platform announced that it too had been a victim of a database hack, back in 2013 in which 65 million passwords were nicked. Tumblr too was in the dark about the hack until May and now those passwords and logins are also up for sale on the same dark web marketplace as the LinkedIn data, all for the low, low price of $150.  
Granted, the reason the lot is being sold for so little is that the passwords were very heavily salted. No, it’s not that the hackers are on a low NaCl diet, _salting_ is the process of applying a random string of data to passwords to further modify an already hashed (encrypted) value. Since there isn’t too much a hacker can do with the info, it’s not all that valuable. But props to Tumblr for making their passwords so darn hard to crack!  
**Myspace** – Up next in the database hackathon, Myspace, the social media network that you probably forgot you were ever on, announced that their data base had been breached and along with it came a staggering 350 million passwords and logins.  
Wait, before you pat yourself on the back for not having used the site since like 2007, understand that if you ever had an account, your password, as old as it may be, is still stored on their servers. And guess what?! Peace is selling the whole load for $2800! And unlike the still-around and sort of useful tumblr, turns out that Myspace did a pretty crummy job of protecting the passwords in its keep. The passwords were hashed (converted into a random string of text representing the original data) with the now-outdated SHA1 cryptographic algorithm, and there was no salting applied whatsoever, making those stolen credentials relatively easy to crack. _Yeesh._  
**VK.com** – Moving right along, and entering into the sunny month of June, VK.com, the Facebook of Russia and the largest social network in Europe, announced that their database was breached, snagging 100 million plaintext passwords with it.  
_Wait, did you say plaintext?_  
Just what is plaintext? The words you are reading right at this moment are plaintext. No hashes, no salts, nada, zippo. So these hackers just stole a boat-load of ready-to-use passwords. Not surprisingly, Peace is selling the lot for just one bitcoin, or $580.  
**Baddo? _Twitter??!_** – But wait, there’s more! On June 2nd, Motherboard.com reported that passwords usernames, email addresses and dates of birth associated with accounts on the dating-focused, Europe-based social network Badoo, began showing up in dark web marketplaces. The exact number of accounts associated with the hack is unknown and Badoo, for its part, says the claims are unsubstantiated.  
Regarding the potential Badoo hack, security expert Troy Hunt [cautions people from jumping to conclusions](http://windowsitpro.com/troy-hunts-security-sense/security-sense-think-carefully-claiming-company-was-hacked) when it comes to hacks that have not been verified “I’m concerned to see claims that don’t appear to have been fully substantiated….Accusations of a site being hacked have serious consequences.” That being the case, we won’t even mention that just today, sources are springing up with claims of leaked Twitter passwords and login credentials for sale in the last week on dark web forums…  
**Well isn’t this just a tad disheartening**  
In 2012, the then-FBI director Robert Mueller said at the annual RSA security conference “I am convinced that there are only two types of companies: those that have been hacked and those that will be. And even they are converging into one category: companies that have been hacked and will be hacked again.” If we can learn anything from the hacking marathon of the past few weeks it’s that we cannot leave our digital security in the hands of others and expect that it will be kept safe. Perhaps a few years back you could have created an account on a website, expecting your password to protect your data behind it. Clearly this is no longer the case.  
Nowadays your best bet is to [enable multi-factor authentication](https://www.turnon2fa.com/) for all your logins and disable zombie accounts that you no longer use, like your very-defunct Myspace account.  
Meanwhile here are some tips to follow if you think your information has already been compromised in a breach:

*   Go to [haveibeenpwned.com](https://haveibeenpwned.com/), Troy Hunt’s website and see if your information comes up there. If it does, you know your information has been compromised.
*   Change all (and we mean ALL) your passwords immediately. Follow the instructions here to create solid new passwords for all you accounts .
*   Watch out for phishing emails. Now that your email address has been exposed and is up for sale, you’ll probably get a truckload of spam . Most of it is clearly junk but every now and then a savvy spammer/phisher comes up with a convincing story. Just remember they are targeting you so keep your guard up at all times
*   Keeping in mind that your email address is floating round the dark web, make sure you have a [reliable anti-malware program like RCS](https://www.reasoncoresecurity.com/download-free.aspx) to block any malicious attachments or links in emails that may come your way.

One factor that remains unknown in this mega-spate of hacks is whether “Peace” himself is behind the all the hacks or if he is just the liaison between hackers and marketplaces. And because he is selling the data on the dark web, which is encrypted, he is essentially untraceable, so at the moment, he is free to do as he wishes with the data dumps therein. As time goes on and more details emerge, let’s hope more passwords and hacks don’t emerge as well.

29_National_Stop_Bullying_Day_How_Can_You_Do_Your_Part_1b30dfe9a2.avif

Invariably, if you use the internet a lot, you probably hear the term “The cloud” pretty often. You know, it comes around in statements like “Oh, now we’ve moved over to the cloud” or “Use our cloud-based software!” You just smile and nod, as if you totally understand, _you are down with this cloud thing_. But really, you’re saying to yourself “Oh great, that cloud thing again. Now what the heck does that even mean?”  
We figured that you might be a closet-cloud-confusee, so we’ll help you understand just what the cloud is and how it matters to your security.  
**Earth No, Computer Science**  
Once upon a time, the only clouds we ever talked about were cumulus, cirrus or had silver linings. Now we talk about different clouds, not made up of liquid droplets but instead the ones that hold the bits and bytes of your data.  
You might be thinking “Hold them horses! How did my bytes and my data get on to this cloud thingy?” Well, that’s easy – you put it there.  
Okay, let’s back up for just a moment and think about it this way – In simple terms, “The cloud” is really just a metaphor for the internet and “cloud computing” is when you access and store files over the internet, rather than on your personal local hard drive. Mega-tech giants like Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Rackspace essentially rent out space on their servers, allowing companies and individuals to store their stuff there. Some notable examples of businesses that use the cloud are Netflix, who uses the Amazon cloud (AWS) and Coca Cola and Best Buy, who rent out space on the Google cloud. It’s not only about using their servers but also having access to their world-class tools and services, which is an important plus for businesses.  
**Surprise! You’re in the cloud!**  
Now back to you – You likely have at least a portion of your personal information stored in the cloud, that is if you have a Gmail/Google Drive account. When you sign up for a Gmail account you not only get an email address, you also get 15 GB of data storage for free. Pretty sweet, ‘eh? Keep in mind that this space is shared across all your Google-associated accounts like your Gmail account, your docs and your Google Photos so even though it’s a sizable amount of space, you might end up maxing out eventually. (If you do max out, that’s okay – just start deleting the stuff you don’t need and _voila_, you’ve got yourself more free storage space – yay! Alternatively, you can just pay for more space on one of their plans.)  
Other common cloud-based accounts you might use are DropBox, iCloud (that one was pretty self evident, now wasn’t it?) Amazon Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. At their core, they all function in pretty much the same manner, with a local folder on your desktop or inside the application that’s linked to a duplicate cloud version of the file back at the main server. And as long as you have your password and login info, you can log on to your account from any device, anywhere. This is an awesome perk of cloud computing – If it ever happens that your computer crashes or gets crashed, you can still access the files saved in your cloud accounts. (Side note, Although truthfully, when it comes to restoring files lost in crashes or other worst-case-scenarios, it’s much better to subscribe a cloud-based backup service like [Crashplan](https://www.crashplan.com/en-us/), [Acronis](http://www.acronis.com/en-eu/), [Backblaze](https://www.backblaze.com/), or [iDrive](https://www.idrive.com/), as these services backup all your files and folders automatically, not just the ones directly connected to cloud services like Google and DropBox)  
**What about security?**  
But if you’ve been reading the RCS blog long enough, all this ease-of-access [should set off some bells in your head.](https://blog.reasoncoresecurity.com/2015/07/29/google-drive-has-a-problem-and-now-its-your-problem-too/) After all, if your information is being stored on somebody else’s server, what’s protecting the integrity of your data? And after all, iCloud was hacked back in the summer of 2014, spilling inappropriate pics of celebs that had been stored in their personal iCloud accounts on to the internet – So is it really all that smart of an idea to store data in the cloud?  
The simple truth is that data storage in the cloud is pretty secure. (In fact the infamous iCloud hack wasn’t really a hack to the iCloud server itself, it happened because of a vulnerability in Apple’s password system, allowing hackers to guess the celebs passwords.) When Google, DropBox, Amazon or any other cloud-based provider stores your information, it is immediately encrypted with varying high levels of encryption, according to the provider. So while information on the Google cloud is encrypted in 128 bit AES and DropBox uses 256 bit AES, this isn’t akin to saying Google uses SPF 5 to block the sun’s harmful rays and DropBox uses SPF 65 to block those same rays, ergo DropBox must be 60 times more powerful. Using the sunblock analogy, it’s much closer to saying that Google uses SPF 65 and DropBox uses SPF 70 – Really, after SPF 40, they are all going to accomplish their job pretty well.  
And the other simple truth is that the idea of keeping your information stored exclusively on your hard drive has one major knock against it – You. The mere fact that your external hard drive has to be managed by one single person, who may or may not have a high level of tech proficiency (okay, call it a high level of geekdom) means that it’s potentially open to more hacks than information stored in the cloud. Then there are all the physical mishaps that could, in theory, zap your hard drive as well – fires, burglary, the zombie resurgence, you get the idea. It’s also cumbersome and bulky to transport so you could just download the files you need onto a flash drive – But that in-and-of itself is a bit of a process which could get the less-technically inclined among us into trouble.  
**The fix is in – Enable multi factor authentication and use strong passwords**  
If you’re still not comfortable with the idea of keeping all your data behind a simple password (good thinking!), [you should really consider enabling multi-factor authentication](http://www.cnet.com/news/two-factor-authentication-what-you-need-to-know-faq/) (also called 2-step authentication and 2FA by some companies). What this means on a practical level is that every time you log in to your cloud account you’ll have to enter not only your password but another factor as well . The axiom for understanding what is needed in the process is “ Something you have and something you know” The something you know part of the statement is easy – that’s your password, PIN or another piece of information that you have designated as how you identify yourself. The “something you have” part refers to something that only you have, like a biometric factor (such as a fingerprint) or a code sent to your phone in an SMS. Sure it’s more work, but it’s a heck of a lot harder for a would-be criminal to breach a cloud-based account that’s protected with multi-factor authentication. When used in conjunction with a strong and unique password, your cloud-based accounts should be a-okay.  
So this cloud thing turns out to be a pretty convenient and nifty way to store and access your data. Making sure you take the right precautions will help make it a safe way to store your data, too.

#Uncategorized

The Mega Hacks Cometh!

Are You a Closet-Cloud-Confusee? Understanding The Cloud and What it Means for Your Security

June is Internet Safety Month – How Safe are Your Kids on Social Media?

Mark Zuckerberg Gets a Lesson in Password Safety

#Uncategorized

The Mega Hacks Cometh!

Are You a Closet-Cloud-Confusee? Understanding The Cloud and What it Means for Your Security

June is Internet Safety Month &#8211; How Safe are Your Kids on Social Media?

Mark Zuckerberg Gets a Lesson in Password Safety

June is Internet Safety Month – How Safe are Your Kids on Social Media?