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- The subscriber login details of some Showmax customers were leaked online.
- A Showmax statement said it was an "external incident".
- The affected data is no longer online and affected customers were notified and logged out of their accounts.
- For more stories, visit the Tech and Trends homepage.
The subscriber login details of more than 27 000 Showmax customers were recently published on an illicit website following a data breach.
Showmax released a statement on Friday, 2 June, that provided some information about the data breach.
The statement said an unknown party published a small number of subscriber login details on an illicit website.
It claimed the data breach was "an external incident and that there was no breach of Showmax's databases".
Showmax notified customers that their personal information had been compromised and instructed all affected users to change their passwords.
Affected users were automatically logged out of their accounts, according to Laura Cooke, the head of communications at Showmax.
Cooke confirmed to News24 that the emails and passwords of a small number of Showmax customers were shared on an illicit website.
She said Showmax wouldn't share specific details, including the exact number of accounts that were affected at this time.
MyBroadband said it found a post on a hacker forum, which claimed to have the passwords and usernames of 27 911 Showmax customers.
The Showmax statement said "the affected data is no longer available online, and all impacted customers have been notified and advised to reset their passwords".
"As soon as we were notified about this, our cybersecurity team initiated an investigation to assess the scope and nature of the incident."
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Cooke provided assurances to Showmax customers.
She said:
"We continuously review and update our security protocols to ensure the ongoing safety of user data."
She said good password management practices were strongly advisable.
"We encourage all our customers to apply good password habits. Don't reuse passwords across multiple sites, do create strong passwords, consider using a password manager application, regularly update passwords and avoid sharing passwords with others."
