Millions of members on an adult dating site may be biting their fingernails today, wondering if their intimate personal information will be made public.
Adult Friend Finder has been hacked and user information – including names, addresses and sexual preferences – has been leaked over the dark web.
The leaked information was found by Channel 4 News in a secretive chat forum on the "dark web" during an investigation into cyber crime. The dark web is the portion of the Internet that cannot be indexed by traditional search engines like Google, and is home to plenty of illegal Internet activity.
The posted data reveals potentially embarrassing information about users — such as their sexual preferences, whether they're looking for men or women, and even details about users seeking extramarital affairs. The leaks include email addresses, usernames, birthdays, postal codes and unique internet addresses for more than 3.9 million users on Adult Friend Finder.
The site boasts 63 million users worldwide — many of whom may be very nervous about the leak. Being exposed as belonging to an adult dating site could go beyond embarrassing to actually jeopardizing some users. Channel 4 says the stolen data includes names of dozens of government and armed services personnel.
Adult Friend Finder's raunchy homepage features sexually suggestive pictures of women and describes itself as a "thriving sex community" — with members typically looking for casual sex rather than long-term relationships.
Interestingly – and probably unsurprisingly – despite all the pictures of scantily clad women, the data reveals that the membership is overwhelmingly male. Of the 26,939 leaked users with a UK email address, just 1,596 identified as female — a ratio of one woman to every 16 men.
The personal nature of the data leaves the victims open to blackmail attacks from hackers around the world. Some users who shared their email addresses have already been hit by spam attacks, and those who posted revealing sexual information or details about affairs may have to brace against blackmailing messages from hackers who can easily access the data on the dark web.
Details of how the attack was carried out and whether more data is in danger of being leaked have not yet emerged. The site says it's working to solve the issue.
"We have already begun working closely with law enforcement and have launched a comprehensive investigation with the help of leading third-party forensics expert," said FriendFinder Networks Inc, owner of Adult FriendFinder, to Channel 4 News. "We pledge to take the appropriate steps needed to protect our customers if they are affected."
Some exposed users have already deleted their accounts — so if you're rushing to change your passwords or remove your account, you may already be too late.
