Hotmail account detail posted online.

Quote:

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A report on technology blog neowin.net said that the details of "over 10,000" accounts had been posted to a website.

The blog suggested the accounts had been hacked or had been collected as part of a phishing scheme.

Phishing involves using fake websites to lure people into revealing personal details such as bank accounts or login names and passwords.

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Source : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8291268.stm

http://www.neowin.net/news/main/09/1...-leaked-online



By no means does it mean that Microsoft's (Hotmails / Live's) server were hacked into. It was a mix of phishing and *possibly* password guessing .. However if it was a server compromise then it's rather embarrassing for Microsoft.

I'm wondering why it is not on any other website (ISC center).

Greetz.

I scored myself a copy, pretty scary that a lot of the passcode's were the same for multiple sites . :eek:

this was the biggest accidental release. Pretty amusing because the phish could of got the harvester a nice pay day.:cry:

Updated :

http://windowslivewire.spaces.live.c...0&sa=363915619

Quote:

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Originally Posted by t34b4g5

Greetz.

I scored myself a copy, pretty scary that a lot of the passcode's were the same for multiple sites . :eek:

this was the biggest accidental release. Pretty amusing because the phish could of got the harvester a nice pay day.:cry:

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LOL no it wasn't !

This isn't something you'll find on their history page or anything, but back in the early days, When Microsoft was getting ready to go public with their website, someone accidentally sat on a keyboard, and published the un-finished, not ready, un-tested version of their first website, BY SITTING ON THE KEYBOARD!

I always thought it was funny, given Microsoft's History, that their first web site was published with someone's ass. Which is apparently where a lot of their desktop OSs came from ;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gore

LOL no it wasn't !

This isn't something you'll find on their history page or anything, but back in the early days, When Microsoft was getting ready to go public with their website, someone accidentally sat on a keyboard, and published the un-finished, not ready, un-tested version of their first website, BY SITTING ON THE KEYBOARD!

I always thought it was funny, given Microsoft's History, that their first web site was published with someone's ass. Which is apparently where a lot of their desktop OSs came from ;)

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Where did you read that gore? I tried searching for it, but couldn't find anything.

update is that Gmail and yahoo were affected by this too.

I'd love if anyone could send me some samples. I'm sure everyone got at least one of them.

Here is one that i had handy.

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X-Message-Delivery: Vj0xLjE7dXM9MDtsPTA7YT0wO0Q9MjtTQ0w9Ng==
X-Message-Status: n:0
X-SID-PRA: Yahoo Lottery Games/Lottery <[email protected]>
X-Message-Info: 0Lct38uk7fMWQ9vwjuNeVO7S/0nUGZ0i8cAHvYNj7Ja3bUz1RaFR7PU5xzpYu663wA/WODiR6f3B7y530AnCV4yjQghbGG+E
Received: from smtp3.infocom.ph ([203.172.11.253]) by col0-mc2-f15.Col0.hotmail.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.3790.3959);
Tue, 6 Oct 2009 13:43:34 -0700
Received: from mail1.infocom.ph (mail.infocom.ph [203.172.25.35])
by smtp3.infocom.ph (Postfix) with ESMTP id 918C336BA0;
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Wed, 7 Oct 2009 04:43:33 +0800 (PHT)
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 2009 04:43:33 +0800 (PHT)
Subject: Congratulation!!!
From: "Yahoo Lottery Games/Lottery" <[email protected]>
Reply-To: [email protected]
User-Agent: SquirrelMail/1.4.10a
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
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Importance: Normal
Bcc:
Return-Path: [email protected]
X-OriginalArrivalTime: 06 Oct 2009 20:43:35.0492 (UTC) FILETIME=[ACCA4840:01CA46C5]





Dear Winner

We are Pleased to inform you that you have won a prize money of
(750,000.00GBP) by Msn/Yahoo Lottery inconjunction with the MICROSOFT
WINDOWS.
we collects allthe email addresses of the people that are activeonline,
among the millions that subscribed to Yahoo,Hotmail and various Microsoft
window users, we onlyselect five people every year asour winners,through
electronic ballotingSystem without the winner applying

Batch number.....................YW/08872/PY
Ref number.......................WL/7662/5AQ
Winning number...................WZ554/30

How ever you will have to fill and submit this form tothe events manager

1. Full name..............
2. Contact Address........
3. Age....................
4. Telephone Number.......
5. Marital Status.........
6. Sex....................
7. Occupation.............
8.State:.................
9.Country................
10.Nationality............
11.how do you feel has a winner.....

Your Reference and Batch number at the top of this mail:

(CONTACT EVENTS MANAGER)
Name:Mrs. Monica Johnson
E-mail:[email protected]

(Msn/Yahoo Lottery Games/Lottery Coordinator).


‹

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I've copy pasted the way it is. So don't worry about the spelling's and all. They are fraudsters not graduates (most of them).

Byte here's a news article about google 'n yahoo.

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Google and Yahoo! on have joined a growing roster of Web-based email service providers with users duped by hackers into betraying passwords to accounts.
A day after Microsoft blocked access to thousands of Hotmail accounts in response to hackers plundering password information and posting it online, the list of victims was growing to include users of an array of email services.
"We recently became aware of a phishing scheme through which hackers gained user credentials for Web-based mail accounts including a small number of Gmail accounts," Google said in response to an AFP inquiry.
"As soon as we learned of the attack, we forced password resets on the affected accounts. We will continue to force password resets on additional accounts if we become aware of them."
Cyber-crooks evidently used "phishing" tactics to trick users of free Web-based email service into revealing account and access information.
"We are aware that a limited number of Yahoo! IDs may have been made public," Yahoo! said in a statement to AFP. "Online scams and phishing attacks are an ongoing and industry-wide issue."
Time Warner subsidiary AOL, in response to an AFP inquiry, said it is "closely monitoring the situation."
"Our guidance to users is to keep your wits about you: do not click on live links, or insert any details into input fields in emails, pop-ups or Web pages if you are not sure where they come from."
Microsoft said it learned of the latest problem during the weekend after Hotmail account information of "several thousand" users, many of them reportedly in Europe, was posted at a website.
The unconfirmed list of Hotmail accounts compromised by "phishing" has grown into the tens of thousands.
"We are aware that some Windows Live Hotmail customers' credentials were acquired illegally by a phishing scheme and exposed on a website," Microsoft said. "We have taken measures to block access to all of the accounts that were exposed and have resources in place to help those users reclaim their accounts."
Phishing is an Internet bane and involves using what hackers refer to as "social engineering" to trick people into revealing information online or downloading malicious software onto computers.
Phishing tactics include sending people tainted email attachments that promise enticing content such as sexy photos of celebrities and luring people to bogus log-in pages that are convincing replicas of legitimate websites.
Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo! stressed that hackers did not breach their databases, but rather email users were conned into revealing information.
"Phishing is an industry-wide problem... exercise extreme caution when opening unsolicited attachments and links from both known and unknown sources, and install and regularly update anti-virus software," Microsoft, a part-owner of ninemsn, said.
Google advises Gmail users not to "click through" on warnings browsers may raise about certificates nor sign in at Web addresses that don't start with google.com/accounts.
Web-based email users who suspect their accounts have been compromised should change passwords and check to make certain any secondary email or texting options in accounts have not been changed.
"We encourage users to be very careful when asked to share their personal information," Google said.
The email service providers urged people to visit pages at their websites with advice and tools for protecting accounts.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by westin

Where did you read that gore? I tried searching for it, but couldn't find anything.

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I think there used to be a link to it on Wiki, but the only reason I knew it was legit was that at the time, it was hosted on their main Microsoft.com page for a very short while like 5 years or more ago. I think I posted it here once but I really don't remember. I haven't found it since, so it's probably been taken down.

I used to have a copy saved because it was to good to let go of, but I lost some back ups a while back.

If I do run across it again I'll post it on here + a screen shot which is another thing they've admitted they probably wouldn't now:

I once saw a screen shot of Microsoft.com saying that Windows NT 4 servers should ALL be rebooted every 6 weeks or so to fix memory leaks. I wouldn't have believed it had I not seen it myself. I don't have the screen shot of course, but you can probably google that particular one.

There is a "certain web site" that used to have a copy of the screen shot, but, you can't google it, can't search for it, and the F word is in the name so it won't show up on here anyway:

****microsoft.com or something like that. You can guess the part it's going to edit out ;)

How you do read this...

Quote:

---

We are Pleased to inform you that you have won a prize money of
(750,000.00GBP) by Msn/Yahoo Lottery inconjunction with the MICROSOFT
WINDOWS.
we collects allthe email addresses of the people that are activeonline,
among the millions that subscribed to Yahoo,Hotmail and various Microsoft
window users, we onlyselect five people every year asour winners,through
electronic ballotingSystem without the winner applying

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And for one bat of an eye even dare think this is legit?
I STILL do not understand how stuff like this works IRL.

Quote:

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Researcher refutes Microsoft's account of hijacked Hotmail passwords

Could botnets, keylogging be to blame for password leaks?
Gregg Keizer


October 7, 2009 (Computerworld) One researcher isn't buying Microsoft's and Google's explanation that hijacked Hotmail and Gmail passwords were obtained in a massive phishing attack.

Mary Landesman, a senior security researcher at San Francisco-based ScanSafe, said it's more likely that the massive lists -- which include approximately 30,000 credentials from Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail and other sources -- were harvested by botnets that infected PCs with keylogging or data stealing Trojan horses.

More can be found here

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Perhaps wasn't phished as a user error but perhaps the result of a hole not fixed (either by user or by MS)?

Go MsMittens! :)

I love diplomacy.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MsMittens

Perhaps wasn't phished as a user error but perhaps the result of a hole not fixed (either by user or by MS)?

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actually it's because people use services like
www.blockeo.com and www.eliminalos.com to check if someone deleted them from their windows live messenger contact list.

I find interesting that if you go to those site's english version, it is reported as a phishing scam by ie and firefox security but not the spanish one.

if you see the list of accounts leaked, you will notice a lot of latin names in there, windows live messenger is very popular in latinamerica.

Wow, I didn't know people actually did that.... I use Linux and BSD so my clients, allow me to mouse over a name, and it has a thing saying "Has You?: Yes Blocked?: No" and that's that.