Google Reacts Towards Rumours on Gmail Vulnerability
Posted on : 27-11-2008 at 0046 hrs
Author : Rif Chia
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Recently, there has been circulation of reports that a hacker could gain control of Gmail accounts and work towards gmail users' GoDaddy accounts. Claims by victims of such activities grew by the day and media coverage increased, which placed Google Gmail's market share at risk.
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Information Security Engineer Chris Evans investigated the reports and has responded on the Google Online Security Blog, saying "Our results indicate no evidence of a Gmail vulnerability. With help from affected users, we determined that the cause was a
phishing scheme, a common method used by malicious actors to trick
people into sharing their sensitive information. Attackers sent
customized e-mails encouraging web domain owners to visit fraudulent
websites such as "google-hosts.com" that they set up purely to harvest
usernames and passwords."
Chris Evans then continues "Once attackers gained the user credentials, they were free to modify
the affected accounts as they desired. In this case, the attacker set
up mail filters specifically designed to forward messages from web
domain providers."
He ends the response by re-assuring Gmail account holders that Google is constantly workings towards enhancing Gmail security. "We recognize how many people depend on Gmail, and we strive to make it
as secure as possible. At this time, we'd like to thank the wider
security community for working with us to achieve this goal."
Tags:
Google, Gmail
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