Teamviewer is blaming carelessness by its users as they continue to face pressure about the hacking of several accounts on their site. The company said that the hack was as a result of some careless use of credentials by the site’s users rather than an internal problem at the company.
Teamviewer is a company that gives software that can be used in various instances to control PCs and also communicate with them. The company was started back in 2005, and it has grown with time from then. The company has about 200 million global customers, and some of them have gone onto the Internet forums to discuss the problems they have encountered with the software over the past few days.
Many of the software’s users went on Reddit, the discussing platform to write about their difficulties with using the software. Users complained that the software and their accounts had been compromised which meant that hackers now had access to their PCs. Due to this, the hackers are now capable of stealing information from the users, and also accessing other various accounts that might be placed on the users account. They also said, the hackers have been purchasing expensive gifts through their computers and also through the Amazon gift card function.
Teamviewer also had a problem with their networks, something which they posted on Twitter for its users to take note of. They did, however, manage to boot back the system to its normal service after a few hours. It appears the company had experienced a DDoS attack which had been aimed at their infrastructure. The company continuously reiterate that their systems were not affected, and there had been no data breach at the company’s network servers and systems.
Teamviewer, however, says that the problem is not with its system but rather with the user’s credentials. The notion might be possible given the leaks that surfaced last month of the LinkedIn accounts together with those of MySpace and Tumblr. Since most users like reusing their passwords on most sites, cyber-attackers might be using those details to try and get into the Teamviewer accounts.
Teamviewer issued a statement denying any breach of their systems, saying that the company would be appalled by any criminal activity and that they believed careless use was the root of the problem, not a security breach from the Teamviewer’s side. The company also said that maybe users had unintentionally downloaded malware and bad software which would put all systems on their computers at risk.
One thing is for sure, the timing of the accounts compromise coupled with the DDoS attacks against Teamviewer comes at a very curious time. Affected users can check Troy Hunt’s Have I Been Pwnd page to check if their credentials are online for hackers to do with as they please.
While you can’t always protect against everything, there’s always more security from the extra layer a VPN gives you.
