We’ve all heard about the recent Target, Sony, and Ashley Madison security breaches where cyber criminals were able to hack into secure networks and expose millions of credit cards, usernames, passwords, and email addresses, well now it looks hackers were able to breach and expose over 5 million accounts belonging to the toymaker Vtech.
The Hong Kong-based children’s tablet and smart watch toymaker Vtech is saying that personal information of about five million of its customers and their children may have been stolen by hackers. Luckily, Vtech says no credit cards were stolen but affected were the names, birthdates, phone numbers, and genders of it’s child users. In addition, adult user information was also stolen including names, email addresses, passwords, secret questions and answers for password retrieval, IP addresses, mailing addresses and download histories. The company says it’s contacted all of the affected users by email and has temporarily suspended some of its websites as a precaution.
So, how concerned should people be if they have accounts with VTech? Customers should not be completely reassured simply because no credit card numbers were exposed. If hackers have enough information on someone (like your username/password, address or phone number) that could mean you may then be tricked at some point into handing over a lot more of your information. So it’s not so much about all the things that were specifically stolen but more [about] arming criminals with information about your identity that makes you likely to be victimized even more in the future. So I would be concerned if you had an account with Vtech especially if the username and password you had with them is also used on other sites; especially if it is the same as your online banking login.
How can people further protect themselves now if they are part of this breach? If you had an account with Vtech and you did get an email letting you know about the security breech you might want to double check with them to make sure that email you got was legitimate by emailing them directly at: toys@vtechcanada.com. Anyone else who has an account with VTech and did not get an email can still use the same address I mentioned to also direct their questions and concerns.
What do you think this breech says for anyone else purchasing online items this holiday season? To start with you should never re-use the same username and password. Especially your bank login should be completely different than all your other ones. I know that means trying to remember many different usernames and passwords, but a safe alternative is using a password manager like 1Password or LastPass. These password managers can be used as browser plugins that remember all of your different usernames and passwords when you login to all of your websites.
Also, if you are planning on making any online transactions this holiday season try to avoid directly inputting your credit card number by using services like PayPal. With PayPal, you won’t have your credit card number stored on multiple servers databases which will reduce your chances of it getting stolen. Finally, you need to be constantly on the lookout for malicious activity. Check your financial accounts at least once a week, if not every day. The quicker you report a problem, the better.
