EBay has now fallen victim to a cyber-attack, which was disclosed by the company Wednesday. The hackers were able to gain access to the database of 145 million EBay users and their records. Hackers were able to steal information like mailing addresses, e-mail addresses, and passwords; however the company assures its users that no PayPal or financial data was compromised during the attack.
EBay has given a small insight as to how the hackers were able to gain access to the information. They claim that the attack took place between the end of February and the beginning of March and that hackers used credentials they obtained from employees. Using this information, they were then able to access the company’s database holding millions of users’ records.
The attack has left many experts questioning how the company missed the attack that took place nearly three months ago. Experts are left wondering if the employee’s whose credentials were stolen were really authorized to have access to such information. EBay is working with FBI to investigate the attack and has hired a forensic division from Mandiant, a company through FireEye Inc. to help with the investigation. Internet security expert Dan Kaminsky wants to know how the information was compromised and why it took so long for EBay to detect the attack. The attack comes in second to the October 2013 attack on Adobe Systems Inc. that left 152 million user accounts compromised, but surpasses the December 2013 attack on Target Corp that compromised 40 million credit card accounts and 70 million customer records.
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