LinkedIn confirms hacking, urges users to change passwords

LinkedIn is confirming that the site has been hacked and as many as 6.5 million users may have had account details stolen.

In a blog post written Wednesday afternoon by Director Vincenta Silveira, he writes "some of the passwords that were compromised correspond to LinkedIn accounts."

He writes they are continuing to investigate and has some advice for users.

Members who have an account that have been compromised will notice their password no longer works. They will receive an email from LinkedIn with instructions to reset their password, but the email will have no link in it. Once you have reset your password, you will receive an email notification from LinkedIn.

In a separate earlier post, Silveira provides some advice on changing passwords.

He suggests not changing it by following a link, not using the same password on all sites, not using a regular word, make it at least 10 characters with capital letter, punctuation and symbols. He also recommends signing out after using a public computer and only connecting with people you trust.

Earlier on Wednesday, Graham Cluley wrote a blog post on Naked Security saying, "It is being widely speculated that over six million passwords belonging to LinkedIn users have been compromised. A file containing 6,458,020 SHA-1 unsalted password hashes has been posted on the Internet, and hackers are working together to crack them. Although the data which has been released so far does not include associated email addresses, it is reasonable to assume that such information may be in the hands of the criminals."

Cluley writes the file doesn't contain passwords and suggests users change their passwords as soon as possible. And if the same password was being used on another site, change that as well.

A user on a Russian Web forum claimed to have downloaded the passwords. SlashGear.com reported hackers were crowdsourcing help to break the encryption.

The hack affects less than 10 per cent of LinkedIn's 150 million users worldwide.

"We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this has caused our members," Silveira writes. "We take the security of our members very seriously."

(Reuters photo)