Formspring hacked, 28 million users told to change their passwords

Formspring is the latest in the seemingly unending list of websites to have suffered a security breach – with the password hashes of at least 420,000 users compromised and posted to the internet.

A blog entry posted by Formspring’s CEO and founder Ade Olonoh explains that the passwords of all 28 million users have been disabled (after all, only 420,000 have been posted on the net – but who knows how many the hackers may have accessed?).

According to the firm, usernames and other identifying information were not published alongside the stolen password hashes. Furthermore, in a positive sign, users were told that the SHA-256 hashed passwords were salted – and that Formspring is now tightening security further by…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Bluesky, or drop him an email.