<p>I just received an email from College Board notifying me that they had been hacked and only email addresses have been taken. This is the second time this has happened to us this week! The other incident involved a county government office.</p>
<p>It must be a giant email company that handles email notices for a lot of companies, because I got the notice today from TIVO, a bank, and college board (so far).</p>
<p>We got the same message from our bank.</p>
<p>Got the same email from Collegeboard. Also a letter this week from an HMO that we were members of over 16 years ago that let us know our personal info, as well as health and financial info <em>might</em> have been compromised. What the heck is going on?</p>
<p>Not to mention TripAdvisor a week or so ago:</p>
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<p>I only got one from Collegeboard…wondering if the other companies handle the email system through Epsilon, too.</p>
<p>I just saw on the news that Kroger grocery stores were hacked into as well.</p>
<p>I got an email from Ralphs that they had been hacked. They are owned by Kroger.</p>
<p>Some would-be spammer just hit the jackpot. Or someone who sells to spammers, at least.</p>
<p>I received the same message from Kroger and Tivo within a day. Something weird is going on.</p>
<p>And did you all get offered a free year of “identity protection”? We’ve also gotten some of these but ours have come in snail mail (guess when you’ve been hacked…using email would be not so smart). The companies offering this “protection” must be making out like bandits. Hmmm…maybe I should buy stock.</p>
<p>We got one from Tivo and Brookstone yesterday. I think Disney vacations is also included, I got a weird email from them this morning that just stated in the header “Important information for Disney Destinations Email Recipients”. There wasn’t anything in the body of the email.</p>
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<p>Google it…it’s being reported all over the internet.</p>
<p>TEL AVIV (MarketWatch) – A data breach at the world’s largest provider of permission-based marketing-e-mail services may have enabled unauthorized people to access the names and e-mail addresses for customers of major financial-services, retailing and other companies.</p>
<p>On April 1, Epsilon, the Dallas provider of e-mail services for companies, said in a news release that on March 30, “A subset of Epsilon clients’ customer data [was] exposed by an unauthorized entry into Epsilon’s e-mail system. </p>
<p>[E-mail-services</a> firm reports data breach - MarketWatch](<a href=“http://www.marketwatch.com/story/e-mail-services-firm-reports-data-breach-2011-04-03]E-mail-services”>Email-services firm reports data breach - MarketWatch)</p>
<p>I haven’t received any emails or snail mails on email hacks.</p>
<p>I received the message from Brookstone. I also have an account at Capital One, so I guess I’m affected there, too, even though I haven’t heard from them yet.</p>
<p>I’m waiting for the deluge of spam.</p>
<p>To be honest, if I got a notice via email of a hacking issue, I would NOT respond to it. How do you know who sent it…the hackers or the real deal? The notices I’ve gotten have been via snail mail and have come from the vendors I know I’ve dealt with. Mine have mostly been government agencies where either a laptop has gone missing or a flash drive has gone missing.</p>
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<p>I already get a huge amount of spam in my AOL account. I may need to close it after 17 years.</p>
<p>I got the Brookstone email , but not too worried about that because it has been awhile since I shopped online there and no longer use the credit card I did back then. Hopefully my bank info will remain safe</p>
<p>MomLive – I got the Disney Destinations one.</p>
<p>Dear Guest,</p>
<p>We have been informed by one of our email service providers, Epsilon,
that your email address was exposed by an unauthorized entry into that
provider’s computer system. We use our email service providers to
help us manage the large number of email communications with our
guests. Our email service providers send emails on our behalf to
guests who have chosen to receive email communications from us.</p>
<p>We regret that this incident has occurred and any inconvenience this
incident may cause you. We take your privacy very seriously, and we
will continue to work diligently to protect your personal information.</p>
<p>We want to assure you that your email address was the only personal
information we have regarding you that was compromised in this
incident.</p>
<p>As a result of this incident, it is possible that you may receive spam
email messages, emails that contain links containing computer viruses
or other types of computer malware, or emails that seek to deceive you
into providing personal or credit card information. As a result, you
should be extremely cautious before opening links or attachments from
unknown third parties or providing a credit card number or other
sensitive information in response to any email.</p>
<p>If you have any questions regarding this incident, please contact us
at (407) 560-2547 during the hours of 9:00 am to 7:00 pm (Eastern Time)
Monday through Friday, and 9:00 am through 5:00 pm (Eastern Time)
Saturday and Sunday.</p>
<p>I have a very nice email address at Yahoo - opened in the 1990s and it’s a four-letter username. It gets an incredible amount of spam but most of it goes into the spam folder. I’m sure that all of the spammers have the address, if by no other means than trying all combinations of four letter usernames. gmail does a better job - spam mails are exceedingly rare. I have more issues on my email lists with people using the lists to sell stuff.</p>
<p>On companies getting hacked - keep your online profile small - don’t sign up for stuff that you don’t need or if you do, use a disposable email account. Stuff like Facebook, MySpace, etc. are a good way to give out your personal information. Consider that anything stored online could be hacked.</p>
<p>I received the email notification from College Board as well, and just this morning another email from “Al-Hawshabi Karim” from Yemen asking me to help him secure his deposits of $18,000,000. I have not received junk like this in a few years, so it is probably a result of the problem at CB - nice to know that offshore hackers got into their accounts. I hope it is only email addresses!</p>