Back in September it was reported that Home Depot’s systems had been hacked which potentially compromised as many as 56 million credit/debit cards. This was no doubt an inconvenience to many users who had to go to their banks and change their credit/debit cards in order to prevent them from being used without their permission.
Well as it turns out that if you were one of those affected in the Home Depot hack, here’s some more bad news. According to the company, they have recently confirmed that not only did the hackers get away with millions of credit card details, but they have also potentially grabbed about 53 million customer email addresses as well.
Now we’re sure some of you guys might be wondering what’s the big deal? It’s just an email address, right? Well considering that your email address can be used as a login ID for a variety of services such as Facebook or Twitter, it would now only require the hacker to figure out your password.
There is also a potential problem of phishing where users are sent emails from hackers who pose as your bank, credit card company, and etc. in order to elicit sensitive information from you, such as passwords, security questions, and more. Now there’s really nothing you can do about it except be more vigilant. However most companies usually do not ask you for your password via email, so if you do get one asking you for it or directing you to a suspicious website, you’d be better off clicking the delete button.
Filed in . Read more about Hacking.