While it was an exciting day for Microsoft yesterday with its latest Windows 10 OS being formally unveiled, the company did run into a bit of trouble as it learned that 18000 accounts of Minecraft customers had been compromised. As it turns out, the leak wasn’t a result of a hack and other causes have been attributed as reason for the login credentials falling into the wrong hands.
In a statement to CNET, Microsoft has revealed that the Mojang.net service hasn’t been compromised and is running normal. As a precautionary measure, the company has initiated standard industry procedures for the situation. This basically means that all affected accounts will have their passwords reset.
The Redmond giant further stated that it ‘takes immediate action’ when gamertags, usernames and passwords get posted online to protect customers. It doesn’t appear that the company will be looking into the situation to find out how exactly those e-mail IDs and passwords were leaked. There also services like Xresolver that display Gamertags and IPs of the Xbox, Playstation, and PC gamers. The information from such sites could be misused by hackers and other gamers.
Also read: Minecraft: Story Mode gets announced, set to be developed by Telltale
And come to think of it, 1800 accounts isn’t a large number considering the popularity and user-base Minecraft currently has. If Mojang.net got overrun by hackers, certainly a lot more passwords would have been stolen. This is most likely the cause of gamers falling prey to malware and phishing attacks.
News of the 1800 accounts getting leaked popped up earlier this week via German website Heise. Hackers will be able to access user accounts and could damage them by using currency to purchase items and more.
If you’re received an email or notice from Microsoft or Mojang stating that your account has been reset, it’s most likely because of the recent leak.