FBI Reportedly Investigating Gawker Hack

The FBI is looking into the recent hack of Gawker Media

that exposed password information and e-mail addresses belonging

to users, according to reports.

A group known as “Gnosis” has taken credit for the attack, and put

the data it swiped into a file that was initially available via The Pirate Bay.

Rumors of the hack began to circulate Dec. 11, and Gawker confirmed

them with a warning a day later. According to the company, the breach

impacted users of several sites, including users of Gizmodo, Gawker and

Deadspin. In addition, the attackers made off with user names and

passwords for Gawker’s staff, as well as Gawker’s source code and chat

logs of discussions between employees.

The password information was encrypted, but was still vulnerable to being cracked — a fact underscored by the subsequent compromise of Twitter accounts belonging

to some users. Many of those passwords were simplistic — an analysis by

Duo Security found the most common passwords were “123456″ and “password.”

For more, read the eWeek article: FBI Investigating Gawker Hack, Reports.