Congratulations Time Warner Cable customers. Today is the day you “get” (need) to change your account password. According to Reuters, Time Warner Cable says they believe email and password details of some 320,000 customers may have stolen. While the source of the attack is not yet known, the company believe the accounts may have been compromised due to data breaches of other companies that store Time Warner cable customer information or phishing attacks. There is currently no evidence that Time Warner Cable itself was breached.
The company was made aware of possible customer account breaches by the FBI, who told Time Warner Cable that some of its customers’ emails and passwords “may have been compromised.”
As a result, Time Warner Cable is urging users to change their passwords right away to prevent any problems that could occur if accounts were compromised. They are sending their recommendation via both snail mail and email in hopes that customers will take the advice and change their passwords.
The importance of developing unique and secure passwords for any account you have on the Internet cannot be over emphasized. With companies’ security and users’ accounts regularly undergoing attack, using simple or similar passwords across sites is just asking for trouble. Just this week we heard news of Fitbit becoming a victim of warranty fraud after hackers gained access to user accounts and leveraged them to get new devices for free. The accounts that were breached were customers who used the same username and password on other websites.
To keep your accounts safe from attackers, it is best to use a strong and unique password that differs from other accounts you have. In addition enabling two-factor authentication on accounts that permit it will further prevent breaches from taking place.
