After hackers last week breached the LinkedIn site, stealing more than 6 million user passwords, analysts are debating whether the attack will cause long-term damage to the social network.
In the
attack, users' passwords were
posted publicly to a Russian hacker forum. The incident garnered a lot of headlines, both in the trade and mainstream news media, and LinkedIn was accused of using lax
security and having nothing more than light encryption to safeguard its users data.
Many companies, including
LinkedIn suffer security breaches. What's causing the furor over the LinkedIn breach is that the company makes its name and its money from user data, yet it failed to take what security experts would call adequate steps to secure its bread and butter.
Critics accuse the company of failing to protect its users. Will users stand by their social network or will they flee?
