Mozilla introduces FireFox Monitor | A new way to check if your account has been hacked

[AlTech]

Mozilla is introducing FireFox Monitor. It's a new way to check if your account(s) has been hacked.

 

Users can enter their email address into a text field and it'll show if the account has been hacked/compromised.

 

Users can also signup to be notified if one of their accounts gets hacked. Although if their email has been hacked that probably wouldn't help.

 

Screenshot from Email:

 

 

 

 

Quote

Data breaches, when information like your username and password are stolen from a website you use, are an unfortunate part of life on the internet today. It can be hard to keep track of when your information has been stolen, so we’re going to help by launching Firefox Monitor, a free service that notifies people when they’ve been part of a data breach. After testing this summer, the results and positive attention gave us the confidence we needed to know this was a feature we wanted to give to all of our users.

 

 

Cool stuff. I definitely trust Mozilla with this more than some other similar solutions that have showed up in the past. Definitely gonna try it out later .

 

Sources:

• YouTube video above
• Email from Mozilla
• Mozilla Blog Post

[AlTech]

3 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

snip

Unlucky .

 

My Patreon account was also breached in 2015. Since then I've changed my password.

[Cedimedi]

Well, looks the same as https://haveibeenpwned.com which has existed for ages

 

Edit: oh the data is actually by them

[ZacoAttaco]

Mozilla are doing some great work right now, after abandoning their mobile OS, they've had more time to work on what they do best. Don't sleep on them guys.

[AlTech]

Just now, Cedimedi said:

Well, looks the same as https://haveibeenpwned.com which has existed for ages

I would say this looks more polished and it's good to have multiple products within the same product category.

[ZacoAttaco]

4 minutes ago, Cedimedi said:

Well, looks the same as https://haveibeenpwned.com which has existed for ages

 

Looks like they're actually just using that same database.

[ZacoAttaco]

3 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

I would say this looks more polished and it's good to have multiple products within the same product category. 

Does haveibeenpwned? have the email alert? That seems like a really useful feature.

[ZacoAttaco]

5 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

I just tried both of them and the Have I Been Pwned one actually showed 2 extra websites where my account has been compromised so I think I prefer the Have I Been Pwned one

I think as time goes on, Mozilla will continue to develop this feature and add new functionality, so while pwned is more accurate now, I think Firefox monitor has a lot of promise.

 

For example, what if when you go on to a new website, log in or sign up, Firefox could let you know "Hey, this website has been breached in the last 3 months so be careful" or it could just say "Hey, we think your account has been breached". Functionality like that would be excellent if it were tied into the browser itself.

[TetraSky]

Quote

Breach data provided by Have I Been Pwned

So... It's a pointless website then.

[kirashi]

16 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Mozilla is introducing FireFox Monitor. It's a new way to check if your account(s) has been hacked.

--SNIP--

Cool stuff. I definitely trust Mozilla with this more than some other similar solutions that have showed up in the past. Definitely gonna try it out later .

4 minutes ago, Cedimedi said:

Well, looks the same as https://haveibeenpwned.com which has existed for ages

2 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

I would say this looks more polished and it's good to have multiple products within the same product category.

Just now, ZacoAttaco said:

Looks like they're actually just using that same database.

12 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

I just tried both of them and the Have I Been Pwned one actually showed 2 extra websites where my account has been compromised so I think I prefer the Have I Been Pwned one

If one were to research this a bit deeper, one would see it's literally a frontend for haveibeenpwned.com as outlined in the following blog post.

https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2018/06/25/testing-firefox-monitor-a-new-security-tool/

Quote

Partnership with HaveIBeenPwned.com
In order to create Firefox Monitor, we have partnered with HaveIBeenPwned.com (HIBP). HIBP is a valuable service, operated by Troy Hunt, one of the most renowned and respected security experts and bloggers in the world.

Troy Hunt, the security researcher behind HIBP.com, also has a blog about the partnership as well, including partnering with 1Password too.

https://www.troyhunt.com/were-baking-have-i-been-pwned-into-firefox-and-1password/

 

And companies wonder why we don't trust them with out data. Well, gee, maybe if you protected your systems using one-way encryption on everything users would be a little more forthcoming with providing their data, and you wouldn't get sued for privacy breaches as often. 

 

 

[ZacoAttaco]

3 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

Oh my gosh I'd actually really love this

Got to go, just going to go apply for a job on the Mozilla Firefox team.

Just now, TetraSky said:

So... It's a pointless website then. 

At the moment, but if it could be tied into browser functionality down the line, it could be very useful.

3 minutes ago, kirashi said:

Troy Hunt, the security researcher behind HIBP.com, also has a blog about the partnership as well, including partnering with 1Password too.

https://www.troyhunt.com/were-baking-have-i-been-pwned-into-firefox-and-1password/

 

And companies wonder why we don't trust them with out data. Well, gee, maybe if you protected your systems using one-way encryption on everything users would be a little more forthcoming with providing their data, and you wouldn't get sued for privacy breaches as often. 

Thanks for this, I'll have to have a look at his website, it's really fascinating stuff.

 

[AlTech]

9 minutes ago, TetraSky said:

So... It's a pointless website then.

Not necessarily. You can get an email when your account has been hacked.
 

Also, realistically there was no way haveibeenpwned would have ever gone mainstream with normies using it but Mozilla branding this and marketing it means a bunch of non-techies might find out about it. And a bunch of techies might find out about it who otherwise might not have.

[ZacoAttaco]

31 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Not necessarily. You can get an email when your account has been hacked.
 

Also, realistically there was no way haveibeenpwned would have ever gone mainstream with normies using it but Mozilla branding this and marketing it means a bunch of non-techies might find out about it. And a bunch of techies might find out about it who otherwise might not have.

If Google somehow implements a similar feature, all of sudden, a lot more people will start becoming more aware of online security and the importance of strong passwords and the like.

[TetraSky]

50 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Not necessarily. You can get an email when your account has been hacked.

You can also get an email like that from the source.

 

But I guess you're right, now that Mozilla is "advertising" it, the mainstream will be made aware of the importance of better password security.

[BuckGup]

Uh oh this isn't good. My good emails on a pastebin somewhere. 2FA for the win

[Guest]

This explains when my email got stolen. Lost so much in 2014, thanks to the breaches of Kickstarter, myRepoSpace 000webhost, MPGH, Adobe, tumblr and Disqus. Dating back to 2012, so for 3 years someone had access to my email and I didn’t even know it!

[Guest]

I mainly use chrome as my primary web browser, how would someone know if their account has been compromised on other browser platforms without waiting for the media to tell them that a company had a data breach?

[aezakmi]

So far so good

 

yay

[ZacoAttaco]

16 minutes ago, PC_Master said:

I mainly use chrome as my primary web browser, how would someone know if their account has been compromised on other browser platforms without waiting for the media to tell them that a company had a data breach?

I don't think you actually need Firefox to use it, it's just a webpage designed by Mozilla so you 'should' be able to use it on Chrome too.

[WereCat]

4 hours ago, OnyxArmos said:

Oh my god thank you so much, I just used it and it came up with websites I used a long long time ago.

 

I got 4 results as well but when I signed up with an email I got 7 results, one of which was from September this year

[Blake]

4 hours ago, ZacoAttaco said:

Does haveibeenpwned? have the email alert? That seems like a really useful feature.

yep.

[Blake]

3 hours ago, TetraSky said:

But I guess you're right, now that Mozilla is "advertising" it, the mainstream will be made aware of the importance of better password security.

You have more faith in humanity then you should.

 

Everyone knows about password security, but it don't change anything unless you enforce a password policy. Even users end up doing the bare minimum next time they have to change their password (i.e. count from 1 at the end of your password)

[NumLock21]

I can finally cure my boredom by typing in random email address and see if they're pwned or not. YAY!

[ZacoAttaco]

16 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

I can finally cure my boredom by typing in random email address and see if they're pwned or not. YAY!

I'm going for the high score.

[ZacoAttaco]

4 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

LOL, my actual personal email says I've been pwned on 7 websites, see if you can find an email with more than that..

I'm fortunate, only have 2 emails, with 2 data breaches each. Unreal Engine, Adobe, Edmodo and another breach in February got me.

 

Wow, that Adobe breach was huge.