Hotmail Hacked

SyD writes " Apparently there is a major security hole on Hotmail that could allow crackers to read your e-mail. A hacking group known as root core discovered the hole and reported it to Microsoft. " This isn't the first time that the folks who are gonna give us a internet wide universal login system had a hole. The funny part is that I posted a story almost exactly like this like 2 years ago, and about once a week, someone emails me and says "I think my boyfriend/girlfriend is cheating on me and I really need to know the backdoor into hotmail to find out". No I'm not kidding. You can't make that stuff up.

Comments

Re:Informative - More like criminal action actuall

[startled]

"(pretty disclaimers aside you are legally responsible for the content here - its just that no one has decided to pursue it yet)"

This suit is the closest I've managed to dig up so far, but between Communications Privacy Decency Act (or somesuch) and DMCA, along with a prevailing broad interpretation of "service provider", most message boards such as AOL, etc., have been found to have no liability for what goes on. If that weren't the case, ezboards would've been toast a long time ago, and AOL would be fighting dozens of lawsuits a month. Do you have any examples of case law to back up your statement?

Is it still open?

[update()]

I'm not one of those people who starts gloating every time a Windows vulnerability appears, claiming it proves how awful Microsoft development is and how clearly inferior their products are to free alternatives. (How many holes in wu-ftpd do you need before that rings empty?)

But to me, the most astounding betrayal of computer security ever was Microsoft's conduct during the last Hotmail breach. Not that it happened (could happen to anyone) or even that they didn't pull the plug days until days after the exploit was made public but that they kept going for hours after everyone had the URL for the backdoor.

There was a great Salon article by a woman who heard about the breach on CNN, found the URL here and read her ex's new girlfriend's mail. I love the conclusion:

Late Monday, Microsoft continued to downplay the Hotmail hack in a statement published by Reuters: "We're hoping that because we jumped on it so quickly no one was affected."

Fat chance.

I wonder if this time will be different...