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Quora User Data Compromised

blog.quora.com

91–100 of 525 posts

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#91

This is why I hate companies that force you to sign up to gain access to content. I do not want that relationship. Sooner or later those systems will be legacy and then maintaining them will be a pain. Bitrot will set in and sooner or later there will be a breach. One new development is that you used to be able to get your invoices mailed via snail mail. Then that disappeared and you got your invoices mailed via emai…

I use privacy.com and Lastpass to help with this problem. Any time there is a service I have to have a business relationship with that I don't trust to keep my info secure, I use a unique password and a unique credit card number with a tight limit. What's nice is that they tie the card to a single vendor too.

For example, the water company. I know the water bill is usually $50 or less, so I set the limit to $60/mo. As it turns out, they did get breached. I got an alert about someone who isn't the water company trying to hit the card for 80 cents. Most card runners use amounts under $1 because most credit card spending alerts have a $1 minimum. But privacy.com warned me, so I warned the water company, who was very thankful. Turns out their 3rd party provider had been breached and they were grateful for the alert too. Ended up saving a few thousand of my neighbors a lot of headache.

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#92

Wow. If this had happened a couple years ago, before they made all the anonymous entries truly anonymous, this would have been really ugly. It's a valuable lesson in "don't keep data you don't need". EDIT: A little backstory for non-Quorans. Until early 2017, anonymous Quora answers and comments were anonymous to the public but not actually anonymous in the database (they were still "your" entries). In early 2017 the…

Retroactively, right?

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#93
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your main concern is the sheer number of username/unique password combos, pick a good password manager that works well across the devices you use. I’ve literally stopped caring about this aspect of my family’s online life thanks to 1Password. That iOS 12 added OS level integration for the service was the icing on the cake for me.

Agreed. I never would have thought that the problem that motivated Persona would have been solved this way... but the combination of TouchID/Face ID and 1Password has made account setup/maintenance sufficiently frictionless.

Until 1password gets compromised.

https://thehackernews.com/2017/02/password-manager-apps.html

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#95

At this point I am operating on the assumption that ALL businesses that have my data are going to inadvertently leak it at some point, and thus I am attemtping to provide individual companies with as little information about me as possible. The toughest ones here are my online banking and my online health portal, but other than that, I have gotten pretty picky about what information I give any company.

Luckily your bank and your health provider probably have decent security, because those two industries face extra heavy fines for breaches.

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#97
Clearly this is well orchestrated and professional. I'm wondering what could be the motivation for such an attack. There is no monetary benefit whatsoever. Perhaps some AI company wanting to acquire solid data to train their models?

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#98
post #67

I'm experiencing a sense of schadenfruede because I'm embittered by Quora's arrogant "real names" policy. They won't "let me" contribute. Nothing insightful. I'm just here to kick them while they're down.

I believe you're being cynical, because this forced name policy allows for answers to be of higher quality, which is basically their entire selling point - being a better yahoo answers.

If you want anonymity there are other platforms for that, stackexchange for example.

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#99
post #91

This is why I hate companies that force you to sign up to gain access to content. I do not want that relationship. Sooner or later those systems will be legacy and then maintaining them will be a pain. Bitrot will set in and sooner or later there will be a breach. One new development is that you used to be able to get your invoices mailed via snail mail. Then that disappeared and you got your invoices mailed via emai…

I use privacy.com and Lastpass to help with this problem. Any time there is a service I have to have a business relationship with that I don't trust to keep my info secure, I use a unique password and a unique credit card number with a tight limit. What's nice is that they tie the card to a single vendor too. For example, the water company. I know the water bill is usually $50 or less, so I set the limit to $60/mo. A…

I wish privacy.com or something similar was available in my country, Entropay seems to be the only thing but it's not allowing new signups.

Re: Quora User Data Compromised

#100

So I'm not a security expert, so I ask this in real earnest to learn: what is it that these companies keep doing wrong, and/or why aren't they adjusting to the climate that these types of attacks are increasing over time? Or are they trying to adjust, and the attacks are getting so sophisticated that the pace of investment in counter-measures is below that of the pace of advancement in the complexity of attacks? Or s…

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