The BBC (British Broadcasting Corp.) and lawyers for Emma Watson, Amanda Seyfried, and Jillian Murray have confirmed that private photos, including some NSFW* photos have been stolen and leaked online. Media is calling this “The #Fappening 2.0” after last years massive leak of private cloud photos that were released online by evil hackers.

While technical details are unavailable regarding the types of accounts and systems that were hacked, we can make some educated guesses that it is a similar attack to last years leak. 

We know that while it is possible that hackers may have acquired these photos directly through a cloud provider’s system, it is far more likely that these photos, even if stored in the cloud, were obtained through a personal device or social media app access. 

If we assume that these private photos were hacked in the same way that 99% of the other private photos have been stolen over the past several years, then this break-in was completely preventable. In other words, had the celebrities been given basic security awareness training and applied their new knowledge, this could have been prevented. 

• We can have our cake and eat it too.
• We can use Social Media and be reasonably safe from intrusion.
• We can use mobile apps and devices and be reasonably safe from intrusion.
• We can store personal and corporate documents in cloud systems and be safe from intrusion.
• Surprisingly, we can have these things, be reasonably safe from intrusion and it is not difficult to learn or do.

I hope that as individuals, businesses, and organizations we take this warning and take action.

Go get good, trusted Security Awareness training for everyone that you employ, contact with and care about. Basic Security Awareness Training only takes a couple of days and is very inexpensive compared to even the most minor hack or breech. 

Don’t let the Social Media habits of your employees or friends put you at risk of being hacked.

*NSFW means Not Safe For Work