Ian McShane sees Neopets incident as a wake-up call for companies across all industries
[datensicherheit.de, 23.07.2022] Ian McShane, Vice President of Strategy at Arctic Wolf, comments on recent reports of a data leak in the online game Neopets, which is said to affect a large number of users, and explains why this event is a wake-up call for company of any industry and size should be, comprehensive security measures to take. According to McShane, he has more than 20 years of experience in cyber security and operational IT. As a former Gartner analyst, he has advised the world’s largest and fastest growing technology companies and tens of thousands of organizations worldwide. Before that, he was also with CrowdStrike, Elastic, Endgame and Symantec.

Photo: Arctic Wolf
Ian McShane: Safety measures are a must these days!
Data and credentials of over 69 million users allegedly compromised after cyber attack on Neopets
McShane strongly warns: “The current report that hackers have accessed the entire Neopets user database proves once again that no company can feel safe – no matter what industry.” This cyber attack on Neopets allegedly resulted in the data and credentials of over 69 million users being compromised and disseminated online.
Even more worrying, however, is that users still endangered be “when they change their passwords because the vulnerability is still not fixed”.
It is known that many people use the same passwords and usernames for different websites, and sometimes even the Your company credentials used.
Recommendation to the operator: Neopets should provide those affected with a subscription to password managers
“It would be a strong gestureif Neopets, Inc. would provide affected users with a year or two subscription to a password manager like ‘LastPass’ or ‘1Password’ to help affected users instead of the usual ‘We’ll do whatever we can recite the litany”advises McShane.
Apart from that, while compromised emails and passwords could be changed, Personal information such as IP address, date of birth and location were not, leaving users at risk of identity theft for a long time.
In conclusion, McShane emphasizes: “This should be a wake-up call for businesses. There is no more excuses, why only basic measures are taken to protect users. Comprehensive security measures are a must these days.”
Further information on the topic:
hot onlineMartin Holland, 07/21/2022
Neopets: 69 million user data and source code captured, hackers still in the system