Titled ‘Heartbleed’ by the researchers who discovered the bug, it affects an important and widely used internet security protocol called SSL. More specifically it affects OpenSSL, one of the most popular open source implementations of SSL. It is estimated that as much as 66% of the web may have been compromised.

Heartbleed is a bug in OpenSSL that allows hackers to obtain raw text from email, instant messages, passwords and documents – anything a user sent to a compromised service. What makes the Heartbleed bug a severe threat, is that it has been around for nearly two years before researchers found it.

Most vulnerable sites will hopefully be patched by the end of the week. Until the sites that were vulnerable to this bug are patched, refrain from sending information to them, or actively log out after use to decrease the risk of your data being hacked.

To read more about Heartbleed, click here and here.

[ Source : HuffingtonPost ]