Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) sites could have been affected by the Heartbleed bug, but early reports suggest it might be safe, according to Cult of Mac. Most are calling Heartbleed the worst security in the history of the Internet.
Apple’s services appear to be safe
Heartbleed is especially bad because it enables hackers to steal login information from affected websites. The hackers leave no sign that they were ever there, and the affected sites probably don’t even know their servers have been breached. Some security experts believe up to 66% of the world’s servers could be infected with Heartbleed, and since each one must be fixed by hand, getting those servers back from the grasp of hackers will likely take quite a bit of time.
Cult of Mac cites GitHub for the suggestion that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s sites and services may not be vulnerable. GitHub lists all of those which it believes to have been affected by Heartbleed, and none of Apple’s cites are on that list. However, numerous big names like Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO), Flickr and Squidoo are listed as being vulnerable. It should be noted though that the list at GitHub is unofficial.
Tips for staying safe from Heartbleed
Heartbleed affects an older OpenSSL version, although even sites which have updated recenly could have been affected by the bug in the past. Cult of Mac offers a number of places users can go if to download Heartbleed checkers to find out if the sites they visit are vulnerable.
It is recommended that users change all of their passwords on all of their online accounts. However, users should only do this if they know that the sites have fixed their vulnerabilities. It could take days or possibly even weeks for administrators of every website to fix the bug. Some sites, including Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) and Tumblr, have emailed users telling them to change their passwords.
