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Yahoo poised to fess up to widespread data breach

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By John Glenday, Reporter

September 22, 2016 | 1 min read

Yahoo is steeling itself to reveal the full extent of a potentially widespread and serious data breach instigated by a hacker named ‘Peace’ which could affect several hundred million user accounts – according to Recode.

If true the hack comes at the worst possible time for the service, just as its sale to Verizon is set to be finalised, with a formal announcement expected to be made later this week.

Consequently, there are fears amongst shareholders that Verizon may be tempted to row back on the $4.8bn it agreed to pay for the business in light of the potentially large liabilities it may be exposed to.

The latest claims are believed to be related to an attack uncovered last August when 'Peace' announced that they were selling data stolen from some 200 million users on the dark web; including passwords, dates of birth and email addresses.

Back then Yahoo said it would look into the claim but notably did not issue a call for users to reset their passwords, something it may now be forced to do.

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