If you use Firefox with your Mount Royal email address, you may have received this email in your inbox this morning:

 

This is a new feature of Firefox. It is important to note however that this “data breach” isn’t really a data breach. If you look closely, it is titled LinkedIn Scraped Data. Also while it says that the “breach” was added to their system October 2, 2021, the so called “breach” actually took place months ago.

What is scraped data? It is when an attacker scrapes publicly available data off of a website.  So technically it isn’t a data breach as the attackers didn’t break into any servers. However, it does take a lot of time and skill to gather that much data at once. As a result few people do it themselves. It is much easier to wait for someone else to do it and then buy the data from them.

What do they use the data for once they buy it? They use it to target you with phishing emails and other social engineering attacks. While there is no need to worry about your LinkedIn password or username being compromised, this is a good time to double check exactly what you have posted publicly on LinkedIn. Be wary of any communications referencing that information in the future, someone may be trying to use it against you.