Jö-Hack: Experts recommend more password security

The damage still appears to be minimal, and the number of hacked accounts is likely to be small – because it wasn’t jö bonus club database that was hacked, but individual accounts with stolen passwords – more on that at Cybercriminals gained access to jö Bonus Club accounts (help.ORF.at).

This happens when you use your email address to sign up with multiple providers on the network and use the same password everywhere – if one provider gets hacked, the email password combination ends up in the hackers’ lists.

Separate password for each user account

Hence the following appeal by Thorsten Behrens of Saferinternet: “Essentially, you have to have a separate password for each user account. It happens again and again that if a password or access data is compromised somewhere, people will try it: anywhere What else can be used? And if you then have the same password and the same Internet address everywhere, then criminals will have access to a large number of accounts.”

If you are not sure whether you have already accessed the hackers’ password lists, you can enter and check your email addresses on various sites on the Internet – for example at Leak auditor from the University of Bonn. From there, you will be sent a list of user accounts that may have been hacked, and you will also receive information about the stolen passwords.

Where possible: Use two-factor authentication

Saferinternet recommends using two-way authentication wherever possible: you have to enter a code each time you sign up, which you – sure – you receive as a personal SMS. “In general, the recommendation: Use a two-way authentication and a different password for everything,” Byrnes says.

Since it is impossible to remember them all, there is the option to have secure passwords generated by the smartphone and then saved directly to the cell phone.