XPost: alt.fat-smelly-hippie, alt.rectum.nearly.killed-um, alt.connecticut   
   XPost: alt.lefthanders   
   From: lololol@divorces.com   
      
   Mysterious hackers known as the 'Impact Team' say they have   
   exposed unfaithful partners across the world, posting what they   
   said were the personal details of millions of people registered   
   with cheating website Ashley Madison.   
      
   A message posted by the hackers alongside their massive trove   
   accused Ashley Madison's owners of deceit and incompetence and   
   said the company had refused to bow to their demands to close   
   the site.   
      
   "Now everyone gets to see their data," the statement said.   
      
   Ashley Madison has long courted attention with its claim to be   
   the Internet's leading facilitator of extramarital liaisons,   
   boasting of having nearly 39 million members and that "thousands   
   of cheating wives and cheating husbands sign up every day   
   looking for an affair."   
      
   Its owner, Toronto-based Avid Life Media Inc., has previously   
   acknowledged suffering an electronic break-in and said in a   
   statement Tuesday it was investigating the hackers' claim. U.S.   
   and Canadian law enforcement are involved in the probe, the   
   company said.   
      
   The Associated Press wasn't immediately able to determine the   
   authenticity of the leaked files, although many analysts who   
   have scanned the data believe it is genuine.   
      
   TrustedSec Chief Executive Dave Kennedy said the information   
   dump included full names, passwords, street addresses, credit   
   card information and "an extensive amount of internal data." In   
   a separate blog, Errata Security Chief Executive Rob Graham said   
   the information released included details such as users' height,   
   weight and GPS coordinates. He said men outnumbered women on the   
   service five-to-one.   
      
   Avid Life Media declined to comment Wednesday beyond its   
   statement. The hackers also didn't immediately return emails.   
      
   The prospect of millions of adulterous partners being publicly   
   shamed drew widespread attention but the sheer size of the   
   database — and the technical savvy needed to navigate it — means   
   it's unlikely to lead to an immediate rush to divorce courts.   
      
   "Unless this Ashley Madison information becomes very easily   
   accessible and searchable, I think it is unlikely that anyone   
   but the most paranoid or suspecting spouses will bother to seek   
   out this information," New York divorce attorney Michael DiFalco   
   said in an email. "There are much simpler ways to confirm their   
   suspicions."   
      
   Although Graham and others said many of the Ashley Madison   
   profiles appeared to be bogus, it's clear the leak was huge.   
   Troy Hunt, who runs a website that warns people when their   
   private information is exposed online, said nearly 5,000 users   
   had received alerts stemming from the breach.   
      
   Although many may have signed up out of curiosity and some have   
   little more to fear than embarrassment, the consequences for   
   others could reverberate beyond their marriages. The French leak   
   monitoring firm CybelAngel said it counted 1,200 email addresses   
   in the data dump with the .sa suffix, suggesting users were   
   connected to Saudi Arabia, where adultery is punishable by death.   
      
   CybelAngel also said it counted some 15,000 .gov or .mil   
   addresses in the dump, suggesting that American soldiers,   
   sailors and government employees had opened themselves up to   
   possible blackmail. Using a government email to register for an   
   adultery website may seem foolish, but CybelAngel Vice President   
   of Operations Damien Damuseau said there was a certain logic to   
   it. Using a professional address, he said, keeps the messages   
   out of personal accounts "where their partner might see them."   
      
   "It's not that dumb," Damuseau said.   
      
   How many of the people registered with Ashley Madison actually   
   used the site to seek sex outside their marriage is an   
   unresolved question. But whatever the final number, the breach   
   is still a humbling moment for Ashley Madison, which had made   
   discretion a key selling point. In a television interview last   
   year, Chief Executive Noel Biderman described the company's   
   servers as "kind of untouchable."   
      
   The hackers' motives aren't entirely clear, although they have   
   accused Ashley Madison of creating fake female profiles and of   
   keeping users' information on file even after they paid to have   
   it deleted. In its statement, Avid Life Media accused the   
   hackers of seeking to impose "a personal notion of virtue on all   
   of society."   
      
   Graham, the security expert, had a simpler theory.   
      
   "In all probability, their motivation is that #1 it's fun, and   
   #2 because they can," he wrote.   
      
   Thinking about accessing the data yourself? Think again.   
      
   “It certainly could be a crime to receive or possess [the stolen   
   data],”� said Joseph Fitzpatrick, spokesman for the U.S.   
   Attorney’s office in Chicago. “Once you download or distribute   
   hacked information without specific permission or a fair use   
   license, you’ve exposed yourself to potential criminal liability   
   under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. An individual who   
   retweets or forwards a link to a website containing hacked   
   information could potentially be viewed as an accessory to the   
   hack after the fact.”�   
      
   Many people won’t get that far.   
      
   “Even if you could download it, most people don’t have a   
   computer big enough to open the file,”� said Cameron Banga, co-   
   founder of 9magnets, a Valparaiso, Ind.-based mobile app   
   developer.   
      
   http://www.chicagotribune.com/bluesky/technology/ct-ashley-   
   madison-leak-20150819-story.html   
      
          
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)