Amazon’s Streaming Gaming Service Twitch Says It Might Be The Latest Victim Of A Data Breach

The long list of data breaches got a bit longer on Monday after Amazon-owned game streaming company Twitch determined hackers may have gained unauthorized access to some users’ account information.

The video game streaming company – which has more than 55 million unique visitors per month and was purchased by Amazon for $970 million last August – announced the possible data breach in a blog post and in emails to users, directing them to set new passwords.

In an email sent to affected users and posted by VentureBeat, Twitch says compromised information may include names, birth dates, phone numbers, addresses, usernames, email addresses and the last IP address logged in from.

In some cases, limited credit card information – including card type, truncated card number and expiration date – may have been accessed. However, Twitch says the company does not store or process full credit or debit card information.

“While we store passwords in a cryptographically protected form, we believe it’s possible that your password could have been captured in clear text by malicious code when you logged into our site on March 3rd,” the email states.

In a blog post, Twitch advises users that for their protection, all previous passwords and stream keys have been expired and that accounts have been disconnected from Twitter and YouTube.

“We also recommend that you change your password at any website where you use the same or a similar password,” the blog states. “We will communicate directly with affected users with additional details.”

The company reminded users that they would need to create new passwords on their next login. Originally, Twitch required users to create a password with at least 20 characters. However, after hearing concerns from consumers, it has reduced the requirement to eight characters.

Important Notice About Your Twitch Account [Twitch]
Change your Twitch password — streaming site warns of possible hack (update) [VentureBeat]

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