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THE BLACKMAIL OF Ashley Madison users has begun.
On Tuesday, a huge trove of data stolen from the extramarital-affairs website’s servers was leaked online.
As well as confidential internal documents, this included user data on the site’s 32 million users.
The information ranges from email addresses and financial details to physical descriptions and detailed sexual preferences.
According to multiple media reports, blackmailers have started trawling the database, widely available online, in an attempt to extort the users on it.
Bitcoin-news outlet CoinDesk was sent an email from a reader who apparently had an account on Ashley Madison. The reader had received an email from a would-be blackmailer called “Team GrayFlay” threatening to expose them unless they sent the extorter some bitcoins.
Here’s part of the message they received:
Unfortunately your data was leaked in the recent hacking of Ashley Madison and I now have your information. If you would like to prevent me from finding and sharing this information with your significant other send exactly 2.00000054 bitcoins (approx. value $450 USD) to the following address…
Meanwhile, New Zealand publication Stuff.co.nz is reporting that an Auckland man has received a blackmail demand from Team GrayFlay.
“Consider how expensive a divorce lawyer is,” the blackmailer wrote. “If you are no longer in a committed relationship then think about how this will affect your social standing amongst family and friends.”
These may be the first blackmail attempts, but they are highly unlikely to be the only ones. The user-info dump is fairly easy to find online, meaning that countless amoral opportunists are bound to try and take advantage of it in the weeks and months ahead.
After all, if Team GrayFlay — or any other blackmailer, for that matter — emailed all 32 million account holders, and just 0.01% of them agreed to pay up the $450 (288-pound) ransom, it would still earn them $1.4 million (0.9 million pounds).
As unpleasant as this financial blackmail may be, it’s not the worst aspect of the hack. The dump also contains about 15,000 US military and government email addresses. Many are definitely fake — users are not required to verify their email address upon signing up — but it’s clear there are thousands of users with sensitive jobs who have been compromised by the leak.
Intelligence agencies are probably already “digging” through the data and considering how it can be used to leverage the people named within it, one cybersecurity executive told The Hill.
- Rob Price.
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Just got the highest electricity bill since the start of the inflation, though usage lower than year before.
@GoodBrother: Haven’t used any Gas since February yet the standing charge may aswell say i was …disgraceful
@Trent: Roughly a euro per day. No usage and still the bill is €60+. Before C-19 my gas bill used to be about €45 – 50 all in.
@GoodBrother: Really. Inflation has been creeping up for well over a year now, nearly 2. Unless you used zero electricity until this bill, or were locked into a really low tariff for almost 2 years, then I do not believe this is your highest bill since inflation started to rise.
@GoodBrother: I got probably one of my lowest one,since the smart meter went in my bills are going down,I can see what is driving my bill.
We are now the most expensive country in Europe to live in. I never imagined we’d be more pricey than Switzerland or Norway. Thank you, FFG. Also on track to become the most obese.14 million each day for our national debt of $250 billion. Third-world heat care systems. the capital’s inner city is rife with violence and drugs. As a country, we are regressing.
Worked hard all my life as a chef to save enough for my own buisness watching it all dwindled away look after there own big hotels cashing in a fortune on migrants while the small tourists buisness get a slap on the face .
There is no end to being RIP of Ireland
@Paul Maguire: unless you are a dole merchant, then you get everything paid for ,
@James Moylan: Said the Kerry man to the bull.
Stop voting FF/FG ye thick muppets, let SF in, we need a change..but in all fairness this open door my documents, come in my friends has to stop. I was walking around Ennis, Co Clare the other, For a bit I thought I was in the suburbs of Mogadishu, only the rip off cost of a pint and newspaper brought me back to drizzleville.
@will o bdee: The shiners will be the same, they will be forced to stay in line, easy to promise the Earth in opposition, but it will either be business as usual or populist policies will lead to medium to long term problems. either way, I cannot see it SF doing any better than the current shower of tool bags.
Mortgage through the roof. Extra 600 a month meant pulling kids outa 3rd level education…
@Monty Carlow: Go on the dole and get mortgage paid by state, medical card, plus many more perks including grants for third level etc. etc.
@paulinlavally@gmail.com: It was the Bankers and Developers that collapsed the Irish economy.
Greed rife at the moment. Could list crisis after crisis but I can’t be bothered
But yeah it was the guy on the dole.
Look up lad.
@Monty Carlow: get them to learn Ukrainian or Arabic ,free everything from then on
@Monty Carlow: do a deal with the bank and keep your kids in 3rd level. Education is the key to a decent job
@Monty Carlow: Must be a big mortgage,mine is going up €38 a month in September,hope you’re kids are working to help with college.
@Monty Carlow: go to the docks near customs during the night,row out some,rip up you’re passport row in early morning,say you’ve amnesia or lost you’re passport rowing,they’re lost on flights available when they’re boarding, lost when landing it’s amazing in a completely sealed aircraft how it can happen shouldn’t be hard to understand in a boat I’d imagine…
In who’s opinion? absolute rubbish,it’s through the roof and slowly but surely rising in different segments be it food, electricity and fuel which will again increase in october,perfect timing when kids go back to school and cold weather kicks in and people need heating oil which they’ve been putting off keeping they’re heads above water at present and we might get help with more money from government, what money? it’s all going up again they’ve said it already the payment won’t outway the cost to the average person we lose again.
Tighten your belts. Store tins of beans. This is the peak.
That’s complete media tripe. Are you trying to feed people carrots on sticks
Buy less
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