Post-Hack 4 Million New Members Added Says Ashley Madison
Ashley Madison says it added 4 million members after hacking scandal
The data breach in August has exposed personal information of some 39 million users of Ashley Madison, the notorious infidelity website for cheaters. Despite the infamous hack that exposed millions of cheaters online, the website now says it has more than 43 million members, according to a rolling count on its homepage.
The hack that a national scandal for the site, revealed public figures such as Josh Duggar and Real Housewives of New York star Kristen Taekman’s husband Josh as being allegedly registered.
Two suicides, one involving a San Antonio veteran cop and another involving a person in Canada, were also linked to the data dump that disclosed names, ages, addresses, phone numbers, credit card details and even sexual fantasies detailed on the site.
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15,000 users were found to have been registered under .gov and .mil email addresses – the official domain names of the American military and government.
And other institutions rocked by the leaks included famed educational institutions like Harvard and Yale, and global bodies such as the Vatican and the UN.
It was also alleged the site had 70,000 fake female profiles used to lure men to pay fees for credits on the site.
Some believed that the controversial cheating service would be ruined when Ashley Madison’s user database was leaked in August. However, as early as August 31, they were reporting an increase in membership.
What’s behind the apparent customer growth? A spokesman for Ashley Madison’s parent company, Avid Life Media has declined to comment, leaving the masses to speculate.
In its last public statement, the company said media reports about the fall of the website were “greatly exaggerated,” and cheaters continued to use the site more than ever despite 32 million of its members’ identities were revealed in the massive data breach this summer.
“Last week alone, women sent more than 2.8 million messages within our platform,” the company said in an August statement.
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“These numbers are the main reason that Ashley Madison is the number one service for people seeking discreet relationships.”
The list of released names appeared to show that upwards of 95% of Ashley Madison’s members were men. The company denied that accusation and claimed that journalists were misreading exposed information. Instead, Ashley Madison said that the ratio of men to women who “actively used their account” was 1.2 to 1.
That number and the number of members that Ashley Madison advertises on its home page is not easily confirmed.
Since the hack Ashley Madison has promised members that security protocols have been tightened to avoid future breaches.
In the weeks following the data breach, parent company Avid Life said women sent out 2.8 million messages during the last week of August.
It’s still not clear that Ashley Madison can survive much longer. Avid Life currently faces a number of class-action lawsuits, several asking for nearly a billion dollars in damages, from customers who said the site failed to ensure their identities were protected.
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The company recorded $115 million in sales and a $55 million profit last year, according to documents the company shared with Forbes.
Former Avid Life CEO Noel Biderman is set to appear on Chelsea Handler’s upcoming Netflix documentary “Chelsea Does”, which is set to debut on January 23.
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