Expired emails provide easy way into Facebook profiles

• Autores: Paul Marks
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 2916, 2013, pág. 21
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Up to a million Facebook accounts could be vulnerable to an all-too-simple method of email hijacking that requires no programming skills or computer expertise. So say security researchers at Rutgers University in Newark NJ. The threat arises, Panagiotis Karras and colleagues say, because Microsoft retires unused Hotmail accounts after 270 days of inactivity and reassigns the email addresses to new users who request them. Facebook, meanwhile, uses an email address as a login. So an attacker can gain access to any Facebook account that uses an expired Hotmail address as a login--if they know where to look.