In November 2016, Yahoo realised it had suffered a data breach back in 2013. Yahoo released information on what had happened and informed everyone who may have been affected by this.

See blog post https://fightback.ninja/test/the-yahoo-data-breach-reported-december-2016/ for more information.

Yahoo has now released more information concerning how this happened.

 

Yahoo say they called in outside forensic experts to examine what happened and there has been the creation of forged cookies that could allow an intruder to access users’ accounts without a password. Based on the ongoing investigation, the outside forensic experts have identified user accounts for which they believe forged cookies were taken or used in 2015 or 2016.

The company is notifying the affected account holders, and has invalidated the forged cookies. They have connected some of this activity to the same state-sponsored actor believed to be responsible for the data theft we disclosed on September 22, 2016.

If you have not been contacted by Yahoo specifically about this, then your account will not have been affected.

However, if you have a Yahoo account then you should have changed your password and security questions and answers recently. If you haven’t done this then you should ASAP and also any other accounts that use the same login and password.

 

It is wise to review all of your accounts for suspicious activity and be cautious of any unsolicited communications that ask for your personal information or refer you to a web page asking for personal information.

Yahoo are doing everything they can to protect their customers data.

For further information go to https://help.yahoo.com/kb/account/SLN27925.html

 

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If you are a registered user of Yahoo then you will have received an email from Yahoo explaining what happened in the data breach that has been reported on TV and in newspapers this month.  Someone collected a huge amount of information from Yahoo without their knowledge in August 2013 and it was only in December 2016 that Yahoo found out it’s security had been breached.

Yahoo believe the data copied contains name and email address, telephone numbers, date of birth and in some cases hashed passwords and security questions and answers. But does not include any financial information or credit card numbers etc.

Yahoo only found out about this when  asked by Law Enforcement to examine some data that turned out to be from Yahoo and their investigation proved what had happened three years previously.

1. As a Yahoo User What Must I Do?

If you have not changed your Yahoo password recently then do so quickly and make sure to set a safe password [https://fightback.ninja/test/how-to-keep-your-passwords-safe/]. You should also change your security questions.

Check your accounts for any suspicious activities and remember that scammers sometimes only take small amounts for a period of months, hoping to be ignored.

1. What About Other Online Logins and Passwords?

If you have other accounts that use the same login and password as Yahoo then you should change them quickly. Once scammers have your login and password they will check other websites to see if you’ve used the same information.

Ideally you should use different logins and passwords for each website you’re registered with. However, that may be impractical for people with lots of such logins but you should at least use a set of logins and passwords and not the same one for every web site.

Note: If you receive an email or call from someone claiming to work for Yahoo – be suspicious and do not divulge any confidential information even if they seem to have your information already.

Go to http://yahoo.com/security-update for further information from Yahoo.

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