If you notice one of your coworkers looking unusually tense and shifty today, it may have something to do with Ashley Madison. And if you’re a faithful partner or spouse, you probably don’t know what I’m talking about.

‘Ashley Madison’ is a hook-up site for wannabe cheaters, the brainchild of CEO Noel Biderman, who also counts ‘Cougar Life’ and ‘Established Men’ websites among his delightful portfolio of businesses. The morality police have now caught up with Biderman’s company, ALM, in the form of a crusading group of hackers known as ‘The Impact Team’. As The Verge reports:

The team is attempting to hold ALM to ransom with the information it has, threatening to release “all customer records, including profiles with all the customers’ secret sexual fantasies and matching credit card transactions, real names and addresses, and employee documents and emails,” unless Ashley Madison and Established Men are taken offline in all forms.

Unfortunately for Biderman, these guys aren’t after a pay-off, which leaves him between a rock and a hard place. They also sent a pretty damning manifesto-type document, in which they make their feelings crystal clear:

 Too bad for those men,” the document reads. “They’re cheating dirtbags and deserve no such discretion.”

They also refer to ‘Established Men’ as:

a prostitution/human trafficking website for rich men to pay for sex.”

I couldn’t resist a quick Google search, and if this depressing landing page is anything to go by, they’re not wrong.

Biderman’s company, ALM, is investigating the hack, which they think may have been an inside job, and couldn’t have come at worse time as they were planning to go public later this year.

A not-at-all-misogynistic billboard for Ashley Madison:

So, if you’re thinking about playing away from home, maybe do it the old fashioned way and head on down to the nearest hotel bar. (Affairs always start in hotel bars, don’t they?)

[source: The Verge]