Hackers dump details of over a million users of AshelyMadison.com online

Hackers have dumped online personal details of over a million users of infidelity website AshleyMadison.com after the latest high-profile cyber attack, threatening to strain relationships across the globe (See: Infidelity site Ashley Madison hacked).

In a follow up of its threat to release salacious details on as many as 37 million customers of the website, which encourages married people to have affairs, hackers claimed to publish a huge cache of email addresses and credit card data stolen in July.

Reuters said it was not in a position to confirm the authenticity of the posting. Avid Life Media, owner of Ashley Madison and Established Men, did not verify whether the data was real, but said it was aware of the claim.

The hackers used the dark web, which can be only accessed with a specialised browser.

Thousands of email addresses from North America and Europe including many linked to corporations and universities cropped up on other sites as people decrypted the database.

An Ashley Madison account can be created using someone else's name and email.

According to a statement by Ashley Madison, the hackers had appointed themselves as "the moral judge, juror, and executioner, seeing fit to impose a personal notion of virtue on all of society.''

A data dump of 9.7 GB was posted yesterday to the dark web using an Onion address accessible only through the Tor browser.

The files appeared to include account details and log-ins of around 32 million users of the social networking site, which is known as the premier site for married individuals seeking partners for affairs.

Seven years worth of credit card and other payment transaction details also formed part of the dump, dating back to 2007.

The data amounting to millions of payment transactions, included names, street address, email address and amount paid, but not credit card numbers.

It included four digits for each transaction that might be the last four digits of the credit card or simply a transaction ID unique to each charge.

AshleyMadison.com claimed to have around 40 million users at the time of the breach about a month ago, all apparently looking for secret hookups.

''Ashley Madison is the most famous name in infidelity and married dating,'' the site asserts on its homepage. ''Have an affair today on Ashley Madison. Thousands of cheating wives and cheating husbands signup everyday looking for an affair…. With Our affair guarantee package we guarantee you will find the perfect affair partner.''