Flipboard, a social media and news aggregation company, is the latest victim of a major cyber attack.
The Silicon Valley-based tech company did not say the number of users affected by the hacking incident, but a quick look in the Google Play store showed that its app has over half a million downloads.
The hackers were able to get access to Flipboard’s databases that contain names, account credentials, email addresses, and passwords of its users.
However, the company reported that the passwords obtained by the culprits were cryptographically secured with a bcrypt algorithm, making it difficult for third-party entities to crack them.
Late Wednesday, the company sent a security notice to all Flipboard users, assuring everyone that the necessary actions were already taken to secure all accounts.
Flipboard Cyberattack
In its notice, Flipboard reported that the initial cyber attack happened between June 2, 2018, and March 23, 2019. However, a second attack was carried out last month, between April 21st and 22nd.
The company clarified that no sensitive information like Social Security numbers, bank accounts, credit card numbers, and other financial details had been compromised in the hacking incident since they don’t collect them from users.
Aside from resetting the passwords of affected users, Flipboard also said that the digital tokens used to connect Flipboard accounts with third-party accounts like social media have been replaced or deleted.
“You can continue to use Flipboard on devices from which you are already logged in. When you access your Flipboard account from a new device or the next time you log into Flipboard after logging out of your account, you will be asked to create a new password.”
The company has already reported the cyber attack to law enforcement. Also, to prevent it from happening again in the future, they have implemented enhanced security measures while looking for other ways to strengthen their system security.
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