According to recent reports, retail giant Amazon has force-reset an unknown number of user accounts, over fears of a possible security breach.
ZDNet first reported the issue. It said that several readers received an email from Amazon saying the company has reset their account password. The email was also sent to their account message center on Amazon.com, and Amazon.co.uk, further validating that it is genuine.
"Recently discovered that your [Amazon] password may have been improperly stored on your device or transmitted to Amazon in a way that could potentially expose it to a third party”, the email read. "We have corrected the issue to prevent this exposure."
However, the email said that there was "no reason" to believe passwords were improperly disclosed to a third party but temporary passwords were issued out of an "abundance of caution."
TechTimes reported that users who received the email were asked to reset their passwords by accessing their accounts on the Amazon homepage and clicking on the link “Forgot your password?” and follow the instructions.
While the retail company has yet to make an official statement on the matter, TechTimes reported that an Amazon support representative in the UK has responded to one customer asking about the email on Twitter.
A Twitter user going by the name Lindsay Shaerf tweeted, “@AmazonUK is this a verified Amazon email or spam? I've been blocked from my account and can't reset password at mo!”, to which Amazon Help replied, “@LindsayShaerf We'd like to check into this with you in real-time” and provided a link.
