Hack Into Hostgator?
May 26, 2008
Forgive the dramatic headline, but that’s the very serious possibility that Hostgator themselves are trying to fend off with an enforced change of passwords for their customers.
Just ahead of the long holiday weekend Hostgator sent out an astonishing email asking customers to login and get a new password - by providing their old password.
The email looks almost 100% like a phishing email and it’s generated support calls and emails and forum posts galore. Hostgator must be buckling under the strain of all the questions they’re getting.
But the email is genuine!
Hostgator are forcing their customers to change to a password generated by their systems, to enhance security. Once you get the new password you can change it to anything you like. Anything, that is, apart from the old password, which may or may not be compromised.
The ‘Gator has told a tale of woe about how possible it is for ‘evil’ forces to get your details. But rest assured, that hasn’t happened yet - so they tell us. Many have questioned why Hostgator would act in what seems like such a hasty and drastic way, unless there were some serious threat on the horizon - or even worse a ‘break-in’ already.
Hostgator remain adamant that this is a preventative measure.
Let’s hope so.
But in the meantime it probably pays to think about the passwords you use. Do you regularly use 1 password across many of your online accounts? Do you understand how vulnerable you are if you do that?
I know how much trouble it is to have different passwords for everything. I have several hundred to contend with because I use a different one for every email, site, social site, membership site that I own/belong to. It’s a real hassle, but it beats having someone walk in and trash all of them because they got one password.
And please, for your own sake, don’t use the name of your dog as your password. And don’t use your name with a 1 at the end. If it’s easy for you to think up the password it’s just as easy for someone else to guess it.
Don’t ‘plan’ to ‘get around to it’, because you won’t. If you’re going to beef up your security, start doing it now. Because it doesn’t look like anyone else will.
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