ASOS app users receive push notifications apparently sent by hackers
BBC News
ASOS app users got a push alert from people claiming to be hackers. It’s unusual because the extortion was blasted out publicly, not handled in private.
Based on reporting by BBC News — read the original for the full story.
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Some ASOS customers have been getting push notifications that appear to come from hackers, and people on social media are trying to work out what the message even means.
The alert is addressed to ASOS’s data protection officer and IT team, but it was sent straight to customers. It says the unnamed attackers have “fully compromised the Snowflake instance”, a reference to the cloud data company Snowflake, whose tools are used by many firms to collect, analyse and store data.
It is not clear whether ASOS uses Snowflake, or whether any customer data is actually stored there. But the company has been tied to a string of high-profile breaches in recent years, including incidents involving Ticketmaster and Santander.
What makes this stand out is the way it was done. Cyber extortion is usually kept quiet, with criminals trying to secure payment without drawing attention. Here, the message includes a link to a Telegram channel run by a group calling itself Xuanye Group, which says it created the channel today and has posted only three times.
Dan Bird of Horizon3 says the notification suggests the attackers may have reached beyond Snowflake itself. If a criminal group can send a push message to ASOS app users, he said, that points to access to the company’s notification system too. If both claims are true, it would mean they had more than one set of credentials in hand.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is the cybercriminal version of shouting through a megaphone instead of sending a threat letter. Public stunt, public pressure, public confusion — and probably public embarrassment for the company if the notification system was truly touched. Quiet extortion is bad enough; showboating usually means someone wants attention as much as money.
Read more about this at: BBC News