A hacker compromised a digital currency forum, bitcointalk.org, stealing email addresses and hashed passwords, reading messages, and, of all things, peppering the site with images Bill Cosby, according to a report from SC Magazine.
The report claims that the attacker gained root access and started running arbitrary PHP code in early September. The compromise was not detected until a week later, when that person injected JavaScript onto the forum, causing pictures of the one-time Jell-O spokesperson and pudding enthusiast to follow users across the forum, replacing all references to BitCoin with CosbyCoin.
The attacker reportedly used SQL injection to exploit a vulnerability in the way the forum software handled escape characters in usernames and eventually purchased a donor account, using it to gain access to various user accounts and change their names, including that of the administrator, Satoshi.
Evidently the passwords were hashed with the SHA-1 algorithm and salted by combining them with usernames. In typical fashion, the administrators encouraged users to change not only their bitcointalk.org passwords, but also any similar or shared passwords for other sites and services.
The forum has since been shut down and migrated to a new host, according to the report.
This isn’t the first time the emerging digital currency market has been targeted by online criminals. In fact, Mt. Gox, one of the most popular bitcoin exchange markets, was hacked earlier this year. Additionally, reports emerged a few weeks ago detailing the discovery of a peer-to-peer bitcoin mining botnet.
