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Accounts Sold By Russian Hacker Might Not Belong to Real People

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Recently, a Russian hacker stole over 272 million logins and passwords, including 57 million accounts, to the popular Russian service Mail.ru. In an interview with Sputnik, Head of Russian Research and Analysis Team at Kaspersky Lab, Yuri Namestnikov commented on web security in general and the incident in particular.

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According to previous reports, a Russian hacker put up for sale a database with information for millions Mail.ru accounts, Reuters reported, referring to Hold Security Company.

Data protection is big concern for major tech companies, Head of Russian Research and Analysis Team at Kaspersky Lab Yuri Namestnikov said.

"In general the risk is quite big because such databases are often used by criminals," the expert told Sputnik, adding that the credentials can be also used to get inside of a company or steal important information from their servers.

Earlier, representatives of Hold Security Company said that the stolen usernames and passwords may belong to the employees of the largest banks and retail companies. However, Namestnikov doubts these assumptions.

"The database was traded for a really small amount of money. It's about 1 dollar. So, the quality of the database is very very low, which means there are not many real accounts of real people there," the expert said.

"There are a lot of databases with accounts from different services. You need to understand that relevant data costs a lot of money. It is about the quality of these accounts, of whether you can actually use these accounts. This is the question," Namestnikov explained.

For the stolen database, the hacker first demanded only 50 rubles (less than $1), but then passed it to Hold Security Company for free. In exchange, he asked the company's experts to post positive reviews about him on hacker forums.

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