Ride-hailing app Uber confirmed that its systems were breached last week, marking yet another major business entity to fall victim to cyber-attacks. In this case, the hacker claims to be just eighteen years old.
The breach first became apparent when the attacker created a fake employee and announced their presence in the company’s internal Slack channel. In an amusingly polite message, the hacker posted “I announce I am a hacker and Uber has suffered a data breach”, before listing some of the systems they now claimed to have access to and a mispelled hashtag claiming Uber drivers aren’t paid enough.
Some employees assumed it was a joke. The message itself has over a hundred emoji reactions from other people in the channel, like sirens, popcorn, and clown faces. The hacker claims they broke in for fun and may leak Uber’s source code.
A cyber-security expert posted screenshots of a conversation with the alleged hacker, where they explain their method. The security expert buys into the concept of the hacker’s age and intentions, but doubts they know what to do now they’ve acquired the data.
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