There could be some awkward conversations ahead.
The personal details of approximately 37 million users of a website for married people seeking affairs has apparently been leaked online after hackers came good on a threat issued earlier this summer.
As well as personal details, the hackers, known as The Impact Team, also threatened to release nude photos and the sexual fantasies of established members if two illicit websites owned by Avid Life Media weren’t taken down.
According to Wired, hackers have released personal details from users of AshleyMadison.com onto the Internet via a dark web that is only accessible using a special browser.
A huge ‘data dump’, reported to be 9.7GB in size, was reported to have been released onto the dark web, including e-mail addresses, social media log-ins, credit card and other payment transaction details dating back seven years.
Earlier this summer, hackers threatened to release data from users of Avid Life Media, owners of Ashley Madison and Established Men; the former has well over 30 million users and a tagline that reads ‘Life is short. Have an affair’.
According to a recent infidelity map posted by Ashley Madison on Twitter, 2.5% of Irish people were members, which works out at approximately 115,000 people.
https://twitter.com/ashleymadison/status/622080853699485697?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Although the information is only available on the dark web, thousands of e-mails have already been leaked after data was decrypted, although it is impossible to know how much of the data is genuine as it possible to create an account on Ashley Madison using fake names and e-mail addresses.
That said, there’ll still be a few uncomfortable days ahead for the many people using the site in Ireland and beyond.
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