518 days
Gawker hacking triggers password reset hysteria
Yahoo, LinkedIn, even World of Warcraft's Battle.net are forcing users to reset their passwords, and surely others are following suit. According to several reports at AllThingsD.com, the services appear to be cross referencing the leaked database of Gawker commenter e-mail addresses with their own user e-mail addresses. If there's a match, the user gets a note saying they need to come up with a new password.
It's not that the companies know your password, and have any idea that they're the same as what oozed out of Gawker's servers. It's just that people have a tendency to use the same password for many or all of their online services. If a bad person knows your Gawker account, who's to say they won't try using it at your bank's website? Scared now?
While Yahoo told ATD's Arik Hesseldahl that it was just a periodic security measure, LinkedIn and the World of Warcraft people were a lot more clear, naming Gawker's hacking as the reason.
So if you unexpectedly find yourself locked out of your e-mail or gaming account, and happen to have ever commented on Gizmodo, Jezebel, Jalopnik or any of the other fine Gawker blogs (full disclosure: I used to work there), that's why. But more to the point: Why wait? Change your passwords, people!! When I heard about the leak, that's the first thing I did.
Now, for a bit of fun: After "password," what's the most common English word used as a password on Gawker sites? If you said "monkey," you're both weird, and correct.
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