Important security information for Xtra e-mail customers

Media Advisory

23 September

Important security information for Xtra e-mail customers

Yahoo announced earlier today that a copy of some of its user account information was stolen from the company’s global network back in November 2014. They have confirmed that the information from some of Spark’s Xtra customers is included in the stolen data. We are working closely with Yahoo to identify any customers who may be affected.

Yahoo has no evidence that the stolen bcrypt-protected passwords or security questions and answers were used to gain unauthorized access to Spark accounts.

Yahoo has confirmed that the stolen account information may have included names, email addresses, telephone numbers, dates of birth, and hashed passwords and, in some cases, encrypted or unencrypted security questions and answers. Their investigation suggests that information did not include unprotected passwords.

Spark will be communicating directly with customers who we believe may have been impacted as soon as we have more information. We would like to remind all customers to change their password and security questions for their Xtra account and any other account on which you used the same or similar information.

To maintain a secure online profile, Spark advises all Xtra users to regularly update account settings with a strong, difficult-to-predict password. All Xtra customers who have not changed their password or security questions since 2014, or are unsure if they have, should do so now on the Spark website using this link: www.spark.co.nz/changepassword.

As previously announced, we are currently in the process of preparing to move all of our email system back home to New Zealand. A number of our customers have already received a request to register on the Spark website. We thank those customers who have already registered and encourage those who have not registered, to do so.

If you’ve already registered to have your email moved to SMX, you don’t need to do that again – any changes you make to your password will be applied to the new system.

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