Disney Plus has only just launched and already it is suffering major setbacks. Thousands of customers of the streaming service say they were hacked after signing up. There also appear to be plenty of Disney Plus accounts being sold on the dark web.
Since Nov. 12, Disney Plus has been available in the United States, Canada and the Netherlands. From the very first moment, many users suffered from technical problems. For example, a large number of movies simply did not work for some users. In addition, there were also people who suddenly could no longer log in. Then many customers complained that they had to wait for hours before their turn came, both at the telephone and online helpline of Disney. In short, the launch of the long-awaited streaming service went anything but smoothly.
An investigation by ZDNet quickly revealed that Disney Plus accounts are being sold en masse on the dark web. For between $3 and $11, you can buy an account that would normally cost you $7 a month. In addition, for some users the problem arose that their Disney Plus account is linked to their accounts for other Disney products such as the Disney Store and Disney parks. So this way hackers could watch much more than just Disney movies. People noticed the hack because they were locked out of their accounts and could no longer log in.
Disney themselves say they take the privacy and security of their customers very seriously, adding that they have been unable to find a problem in their own systems. By this they imply that the problem must lie elsewhere. There are several ways the accounts could have been stolen. For example, it could be that there was spyware on these users' devices. Through this spyware, the login credentials could have been leaked. It could also be that data was stolen elsewhere that could be reused for Disney Plus because the users were using the same passwords. For now, users who complained about this to Disney have not heard back from the streaming service.
Disney would do well to add two-step verification to their app. This would mean adding another step of security in addition to a password. Consider, for example, a code that you receive on your phone and then have to enter in the app. This way you can largely prevent account takeovers.
To be as slightly more secure yourself until then, you can do several things. It is always important to create a new strong password for every new account you create. Never use the same password because that way you will immediately lose all your accounts if one is hacked. Furthermore, other general security measures can make you much more defensible against hackers.
The problem seems to be mainly in the US and Canada. So far, no Dutch users seem to have been hacked. Still, it can't hurt to change your password with the service to a strong and unbreakable one as a precaution.
This news item can also be found in the Information Security file
