Australia’s iiNet investigates potential hacking
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Australia’s iiNet investigates potential hacking

Australian ISP iiNet is investigating claims that an online hacker has been attempting to sell personal information stolen from iiNet subsidiary, Westnet.

iiNet has urged more than 30,000 customers to change their passwords after reports emerged on Twitter, from security news account ‘Cyber War News’, that an unknown hacker was claiming to be selling Westnet’s customer database.

The hacker said that the information included client passwords, home addresses and telephone numbers.  

iiNet CEO Matthew Toohey said that the incident has been reported to authorities, and the company is investigating the issue.

“iiNet is aware of an incident that may have resulted in unauthorised access to old customer information stored on a legacy Westnet system. Customer username, address, telephone and, in some cases, password information may have been accessed, however, no payment details were stored on the server,” he said.

“The system is now offline and at no further risk. As precaution, additional steps have been taken to increase the monitoring of impacted accounts.”

It is not known when iiNet was made aware of the breach, or if there may be consequences from the country’s Privacy Commissioner.

“iiNet takes the privacy and security of customer information extremely seriously and is heavily invested in the proactive monitoring of its infrastructure to ensure the risk of such instructions in minimised,” Toohey concluded.

iiNet purchased Westnet in 2008, and last month, iiNet accepted a takeover bid of $1.24 billion from TPG Telecom

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