“Apple said Monday it was ‘actively investigating’ the violation of several of its iCloud accounts, in which revealing photos and videos of prominent Hollywood actresses were taken and posted all over the Web,” Arik Hesseldahl reports for Re/coce.
“‘We take user privacy very seriously and are actively investigating this report,’ said Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris,” Hesseldahl reports. “Photos, some real, some said to be fakes, are said to have been taken from the iCloud accounts of several celebrities, such as actress Jennifer Lawrence.”
“Security experts said the hacking and theft of revealing pictures from the Apple iCloud accounts of a few celebrities might have been prevented if those affected had enabled two-factor authentication on their accounts,” Hesseldahl reports. “When enabled, two-factor authentication requires users to enter a numerical code that is sent to their phone or another device, in addition to using their regular password. Since the number constantly changes, it makes it much more difficult for attackers to gain access the account, even if they know the password. Assuming the compromised accounts were running without the two-step option turned on, it would then have been relatively easy for the attacker to gain access to the accounts.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote earlier today:
The problem is that too many people use one password for multiple services. The hackers guess it right once and than have access to all sorts of things: cloud storage, bank accounts, twitter, email, etc.
Regardless of the origination of these photo and videos, social engineering hacks can be thwarted, at least for iCloud. Use two-step verification for Apple ID to keep your personal information as secure as possible. More info here.
As we’ve written before: Always use unique passwords and use Apple’s Keychain Access and iCloud Keychain to create and manage them. When used properly, it works like a dream.