Social networking site LinkedIn and online dating service eHarmony warned that some user passwords had been breached after security experts discovered scrambled files with passwords for millions of online accounts, Reuters reported.
The two companies declined to say how many accounts had been breached when they disclosed the breaches in statements issued on Wednesday, June 7. They only said they were conducting investigations.
The breaches are the latest in a string of high-profile attacks around the world that have put personal information of millions at risk. The release of information stolen from the intelligence analysis firm Stratfor in December included data belonging to former U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
Mary Landesman, senior researcher with messaging security firm Cloudmark, said that a hacker who has access to somebody's LinkedIn credentials along with their eHarmony account might be in a good position to commit extortion.
The technology news site Ars Technica reported on Wednesday that a total of 8 million encrypted passwords were published on underground forums by a hacker known as 'dwdm', who was seeking help unscrambling them.
It was not clear whether all 8 million of the passwords belonged to users of LinkedIn and eHarmony, or if the hacker had stolen an even larger number of credentials and just posted some of them on the site.
