5 ms·
(posted this on HN after seeing it on an RSS feed) Definitely looks like it was a large-scale spam operation that was hacked and not twitter itself. I just ed
by gravitronic 14y ago
(posted this on HN after seeing it on an RSS feed)
Definitely looks like it was a large-scale spam operation that was hacked and not twitter itself.
I just edited the title to try to reflect the lesser impact of the leak.
- SomeCallMeTim 14y agoMANY of the accounts fit that pattern. A large number have the same seemingly random 6-digit numeric password. Another large number have exactly 8 characters of pseudo-random alphanumerics. But many of them have exactly the kind of password you would expect humans to have. Maybe those were accounts that were stolen (phished?) and added to the spam operation, but they certainly seem like human-generated (i.e. mostly bad, but more importantly, without an obvious pattern) passwords to me.
- bo1024 14y agoSomething I haven't seemed mentioned, but this makes a BIG difference for the following reason (among others): If this was twitter that got hacked, it implies that they're storing passwords in plain text. That news is or should be a Big Deal.
- Dylan16807 14y agoAlmost all the passwords are 8 character alphanumeric. It would mean they aren't salting, but it's within the range of md5 rainbow tables.