Taking Its Turn at Being Hacked – Hotmail

Reported by several places, though most refer to an article at neowin, about 10,000 accounts have had their passwords released as pert of a hack job, and posted at pastebin.com .

An anonymous user posted details of the accounts on October 1 at pastebin.com, a site commonly used by developers to share code snippets. The details have since been removed but Neowin has seen part of the list posted and can confirm the accounts are genuine and most appear to be based in Europe. The list details over 10,000 accounts starting from A through to B, suggesting there could be additional lists. Currently it appears only accounts used to access Microsoft’s Windows Live Hotmail have been posted, this includes @hotmail.com, @msn.com and @live.com accounts.

Neowin has reported this immediately to Microsoft’s Security Response Center and to Microsoft’s PR teams in the UK and US and we are currently awaiting feedback on the situation. As this is a breaking story please check back frequently as the story will be updated as soon as more information becomes available.

If you are a Windows Live Hotmail user Neowin recommends that you change your password and security question immediately.

Though mine does not begin with a or b, I still changed the password – just in an abundance of caution. You might also, as it never hurts to be a bit more cautious.

Later in the neowin article, it is reported, through the BBC, that Microsoft is investigating how this occurred.

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