Adobe hack: 38 million users affected, not 3 million
Software company behind Photoshop and Acrobat admits security breach a month ago was far bigger than first reported
Adobe has admitted a
hacking attack on 3 October affected 38 million customer accounts.
Photograph: Paul Sakuma/Associated Press
Adobe
Systems has said that the scope of a cybersecurity breach disclosed
nearly a month ago was far bigger than initially reported, with
attackers obtaining data on more than 38 million customer accounts.
The software maker also said that hackers had stolen part of the source code to Photoshop editing software that is widely used by professional photographers.
Adobe disclosed the breach on 3 October, saying attackers took credit card information and other data from nearly 3 million customers' accounts.
The company also said that the hackers accessed an undisclosed number of Adobe IDs and encrypted passwords that were stored in a separate database. On Tuesday, it revealed that about 38 million records from that database were stolen.
On O3 October, the company also reported that the attackers stole source code to three other products: Acrobat, ColdFusion and ColdFusion Builder.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said the software maker believes the attackers also obtained access to "many invalid Adobe IDs, inactive Adobe IDs, Adobe IDs with invalid encrypted passwords and test account data."
She said the company is still investigating to determine how much invalid account information was breached and is in the process of notifying affected users.
Even though the company believes the stolen passwords were encrypted, the attackers may have been able to access them in plain text by one of several methods, including breaking the algorithm that Adobe used to scramble them, said Marcus Carey, a security researcher and expert on cyber-attacks, who formerly worked as an investigator with the National Security Agency.
They could likely use those passwords to break into other accounts because many people use the same passwords for multiple accounts, he said.
"This is a treasure trove for future attacks," Carey said.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said that the company was not aware of any unauthorised activity on Adobe accounts as a result of the attack.
"Our investigation is still ongoing," she said. "We anticipate the full investigation will take some time to complete."
[SIDEBAR: America had deciders that decided BIG was IT. Now IT has learned that AS always in earth world life there is always a BIGGER than IT and an even BIGGEST that is HUMONGOUS and on IT goes in the fantasy of IT.]
The software maker also said that hackers had stolen part of the source code to Photoshop editing software that is widely used by professional photographers.
Adobe disclosed the breach on 3 October, saying attackers took credit card information and other data from nearly 3 million customers' accounts.
The company also said that the hackers accessed an undisclosed number of Adobe IDs and encrypted passwords that were stored in a separate database. On Tuesday, it revealed that about 38 million records from that database were stolen.
On O3 October, the company also reported that the attackers stole source code to three other products: Acrobat, ColdFusion and ColdFusion Builder.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said the software maker believes the attackers also obtained access to "many invalid Adobe IDs, inactive Adobe IDs, Adobe IDs with invalid encrypted passwords and test account data."
She said the company is still investigating to determine how much invalid account information was breached and is in the process of notifying affected users.
Even though the company believes the stolen passwords were encrypted, the attackers may have been able to access them in plain text by one of several methods, including breaking the algorithm that Adobe used to scramble them, said Marcus Carey, a security researcher and expert on cyber-attacks, who formerly worked as an investigator with the National Security Agency.
They could likely use those passwords to break into other accounts because many people use the same passwords for multiple accounts, he said.
"This is a treasure trove for future attacks," Carey said.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said that the company was not aware of any unauthorised activity on Adobe accounts as a result of the attack.
However,
Edell said she could not say whether stolen credit cards or passwords
had been used to launch follow-on attacks against Adobe customers or
conduct other types of cybercrimes.
[SIDEBAR: America had deciders that decided BIG was IT. Now IT has learned that AS always in earth world life there is always a BIGGER than IT and an even BIGGEST that is HUMONGOUS and on IT goes in the fantasy of IT.]
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