The Russian Hack: How 1.2 billion stolen passwords affect you
The biggest illegal collection in history
Earlier this week security firm Hold Security LLC revealed that a Russian Hacking group has stolen 1.2 billions usernames and passwords—the largest collection of stolen credentials in history. Since the announcement, I’ve been asked repeatedly by friends and customers what they should do.
While it might seem like this discovery changes the game in information security, it really just reinforces the importance of basic data protection.
What should you do personally?
The basic advice is not going to change much with this breach or future breaches. First, assume your stuff is compromised. It is always better to start with that assumption. Second, use a password safe. While this is generic advice, it will go a long way to helping to limit compromise. Making sure that the password safe generates all your passwords will ensure that none of them are the same. This will help limit the damage when sites that you trusted with your password are compromised.
Next, change the passwords that are important to you when any large-scale attack is released. This can include financial sites, e-mail, etc. Finally, keep your computer updated. If you are still running windows 98, it is time to upgrade. Keep your equipment patched, well managed, and up to date.
While it might seem like this discovery changes the game in information security, it really just reinforces the importance of basic data protection.
Corporate considerations
For corporations, this is a good time to look at the important aspects of security operations: How mature is your vulnerability management program? Do you have scans automated, sorted, reviewed and delivered with service-desk tickets to the right group for remediation? Does the vulnerability management data auto-create and modify service tickets? Is it integrated into compliance reporting checker? It should be.
Organizations should also be well underway using containers and privileged access control. It is time to build, design, and deploy systems that are repeatable, easier to manage, version controlled and that are not changed in anyway in production.
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