Subject: Ashley Madison Offering $500,000 Reward For Info On Hack Now Linked To Two Suicides | TechCrunch
From: "Eric Schwerin" <[email-masked]>
To: "Hunter Biden" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 24 Aug 2015 12:05:43 -0400

> http://techcrunch.com/2015/08/24/ashley-madison-offering-500000-reward-for-info-on-hack-now-linked-to-two-suicides/?ncid=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29 <http://techcrunch.com/2015/08/24/ashley-madison-offering-500000-reward-for-info-on-hack-now-linked-to-two-suicides/?ncid=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29>
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> Ashley Madison Offering $500,000 Reward For Info On Hack Now Linked To Two Suicides
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> At a news conference on Monday, police in Canada revealed that Avid Life Media, the company that operates the Ashley Madison website, is now offering a $500,000 reward to anyone providing information that leads to the identification and subsequent arrest of those involved in the large-scale hack <http://techcrunch.com/tag/ashley-madison/> that revealed the personal information, including names, emails, phone numbers and transactions from the online site dedicated to extramarital affairs. In addition, the police said that the hack is now linked to two unconfirmed suicide cases involving Ashley Madison users.
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> In a statement, acting staff superintendent Bryce Evans of the Toronto Police appealed to the hacking community, “who engage in discussions on the dark web and who no doubt have information that could assist this investigation.” Additionally, he asked the hacking community to “do the right thing” with regard to the unique situation which Evans said has “enormous social and economic fallout.”
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> “You know The Impact Team has crossed the line,” Evans stated, while asking for informants to reach out to the police with further details on the hack.
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> “This hack is one of the largest data breaches in the world,” he continued. “The social impact behind this leak, we’re talking about families, we’re talking about children, we’re talking about wives, we’re talking about their male partners. It’s going to have impacts on their lives…This is affecting all of us.”
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> The Impact Team, of course, is the group behind the Ashley Madison hack, which involved a sizable data dump that revealed the names of those who held accounts and transacted on the website whose tagline is “Life is short. Have an affair.”
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> Avid Life Media, the company behind Ashley Madison, confirmed the hack but said earlier this month <http://techcrunch.com/2015/08/19/no-full-credit-card-numbers-stolen-in-ashley-madison-hack/> that the data didn’t include full credit card numbers. However, in Evans’ statement today, he noted that credit card data was included in the original data dump, but investigators believe it’s limited to the last four digits of users’ card numbers.
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> He suggested that potential victims should keep an eye on their accounts as a precaution.
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> The hack, which was first revealed in July <http://techcrunch.com/2015/07/20/hackvisitkarma/#.ctrchh:9JUM>, wasn’t only embarrassing personally and professionally to those affected – according to the Toronto Police, it has also been linked to two unconfirmed suicides. Evans didn’t reveal any further details about the suicides at the conference, but it’s not surprising that this sort of worst-case-scenario has resulted as fallout from the data breach. Evans also noted that some hate crimes may connected to the data breach as well.
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> Over 30 million members have seen their information revealed in the hack, and the police also warned that victims may now also encounter spin-off scams – which is when other hackers use their information to dupe them further, such as by claiming to provide access to leaked websites, the police said. The public was warned not to click on links as that could expose their computers to “malware, spyware, adware and viruses.” Other scam websites are offering to erase info from the database for a fee, Evans warned, and some are even trying to extort money from victims by threatening to release their information unless payment is received.
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> In terms of the reward, Evens confirmed that Avid Life Media is offering $500,000 to anyone “providing information that leads to the identification, arrest and prosecution of the person or persons responsible for the leak of the Ashley Madison database.” People are asked to contact police directly.
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Eric D. Schwerin
Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC
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Suite 705
Washington, DC 20007
(202) 333-1880
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