Comcast was the target this week by a group of hackers.
The Comcast hacker logged in as a company system administrator at Network Solutions and changed the flow of Internet traffic away from Comcast to a site that carried hacker messages.
By: Jon Hathway
May 30, 2008 13:25 PM GMT
A group of hackers diverted Internet traffic from millions of Comcast high-speed Internet customers Wednesday night, fouling up access to Comcast's Web e-mail service as the nation's largest cable company tried to restore its Web site.
Comcast said Thursday that law enforcement authorities are investigating, and that it has no evidence that customer information was compromised.
However, local Internet security experts called it a major security breach that was both breathtaking in scope and baffling at the same time.
The hacker could have intercepted Comcast e-mail and account information by creating a look-alike Comcast site that would trick users into entering their user names and passwords. Later, the hackers could comb through the information to access Comcast Web page and e-mail accounts.
Instead, the hackers appeared to be content to simply post a message on a Web page saying, "KRYOGENICS Defiant and EBK RoXed Comcast."
The incident began about 10 p.m., Wednesday, when "an unauthorized person" redirected Web traffic away from Comcast.net and toward a third-party site, Comcast spokeswoman Mary Beth Schubert said.
Instead of attacking Comcast's site, the hacker focused on Network Solutions, a company that acts like a directory for the Internet.
The person logged in as a Comcast system administrator and changed the flow of Internet traffic away from Comcast.net to an unfinished site under construction at first, and later to the site that carried the hacker message, said Susan Wade, director of public relations for Network Solutions.
"We don't know how anybody got access to that information," Wade said, referring to the system administrator login name and password. "It is unusual that this happened."
Customers could access the rest of the Internet and their Comcast Web mail by downloading it to services like Microsoft Outlook.
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