Adobe Systems has said that the scope of a
cybersecurity breach disclosed nearly a month ago was far bigger than initially
reported, with attackers obtaining data on more than 38 million customer
accounts.
The software maker
also said that hackers had stolen part of the source code to Photoshop editing
software that is widely used by professional photographers.
Adobe disclosed the breach on 3 October, saying attackers
took credit card information and other data from nearly 3 million customers'
accounts.
The company also said that the hackers accessed an
undisclosed number of Adobe IDs and encrypted passwords that were stored in a
separate database. On Tuesday, it revealed that about 38 million records from
that database were stolen.
On O3 October, the company also reported that the
attackers stole source code to three other products: Acrobat, ColdFusion and
ColdFusion Builder.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said the software maker
believes the attackers also obtained access to "many invalid Adobe IDs,
inactive Adobe IDs, Adobe IDs with invalid encrypted passwords and test account
data."
She said the company is still investigating to determine
how much invalid account information was breached and is in the process of
notifying affected users.
Even though the company believes the stolen passwords were
encrypted, the attackers may have been able to access them in plain text by one
of several methods, including breaking the algorithm that Adobe used to
scramble them, said Marcus Carey, a security researcher and expert on
cyber-attacks, who formerly worked as an investigator with the National
Security Agency.
They could likely use those passwords to break into other
accounts because many people use the same passwords for multiple accounts, he
said.
"This is a treasure trove for future attacks,"
Carey said.
Adobe spokeswoman Heather Edell said that the company was
not aware of any unauthorised activity on Adobe accounts as a result of the
attack.
However,
Edell said she could not say whether stolen credit cards or passwords had been
used to launch follow-on attacks against Adobe customers or conduct other types
of cybercrimes.
"Our investigation is still ongoing," she said.
"We anticipate the full investigation will take some time to complete.
Source: theguardian
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