Mumsnet says it is 'confident' only 44 users were affected by data breach which exposed users’ personal messages and details online
- The firm was updating its software and moving it to a cloud-based system
- Email addresses, account details, history and personal messages were all at risk
- It is believed passwords were not jeopardised during the period of vulnerability
- Account info could be switched by users logging in at the same time between 2pm of Tuesday 5 February and 9am on Thursday 7 February
Online forum Mumsnet experienced a severe data breach earlier this week during a software change which exposed the personal details of 44 users.
It is believed the email addresses, account details, posting history and personal messages were all at risk.
Passwords, Mumsnet claims, were kept secure.
The site reported itself to the information commissioner following the botched upgrade which caused the vulnerability.
It was originally thought several hundred accounts were at risk but Mumsnet told MailOnline it is 'confident' only 44 users were actually affected.
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It is believed the email addresses, account details, posting history and personal messages were all at risk on online parenting site Mumsnet
Justine Roberts, founder and CEO at Mumsnet, confirmed the data breach in a post on the forum.
She said: 'There was a problem affecting Mumsnet user logins between 2pm of Tuesday 5 February and 9am on Thursday 7 February.
'During this time, it appears that a user logging into their account at the same time as another user logged in, could have had their account info switched.'
The exact amount of people affected by the issue remains unknown but only 14 individuals have so far reported issues.
It has now been resolved and users are being forced to log out and log back in again to avoid any further fallout.
Justine Roberts, founder and CEO at Mumsnet (pictured), confirmed the data breach to parents in a post on the forum. She said: 'There was a problem affecting Mumsnet user logins between 2pm of Tuesday 5 February and 9am on Thursday 7 February'
Not all users were satisfied with the apology and took to twitter to complain (pictured). It has now been resolved and users are being forced to log out and log back in again to avoid any further fallout
Ms Roberts said: 'We do know that approximately 4000 user accounts were logged into in the period in question but we don't as yet know which of those were actually breached (ie also affected by a mismatched login), although we know for sure it wasn't every account.
'We have been made aware by users of 14 incidents when this occurred and have contacted the individuals that we know were affected. We are working hard to establish if there were more.
'We're very sorry. You've every right to expect your Mumsnet account to be secure and private.
'We are working urgently to discover exactly how this breach happened and to learn and improve our processes. We will also keep you informed about what is happening.'
A later statement from the site said it had since been fixed and 44 accounts had been breached, with two being breached twice - taking the total number of incidents to 46.
It said: 'When we have any further substantial information affecting the security of Mumsnet user accounts we will update this page and post on the site.
'We have identified the users whose accounts were wrongfully accessed, by running software to interrogate the server logs in depth. We have informed those affected directly.'
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