Nintendo recently revealed that nearly 24,000 Club Nintendo accounts have been hacked following what was close to a month-long brute-force attack. We are being told that members’ full names, home address, phone numbers and e-mail addresses were compromised during the attack although billing information like credit cards thankfully aren’t a part of the rewards site.
The attack appears to have only affected Club Nintendo users in Japan and was only noticed last week following a large number of access errors. In total, Nintendo said there were 15 million unauthorized login attempts during the attack.
Despite the fact that there doesn’t appear to be any real security threat, it is a bit concerning that it took so many failed logins before Nintendo even became aware of the issue. The company has since issued an e-mail to affected Club Nintendo members urging them to change their passwords as existing passwords have all been wiped.
Club Nintendo allows members to build points, or “coins,” that can be traded in for promotional items. Members can earn points simply by buying Nintendo products, registering their gear and providing feedback. Other perks include a free warranty extension program for registered systems as well as access to limited-edition bonus items like CDs, gifts and exclusive events.
This is the second high profile gaming-related hack in less than a week. If you recall, Ubisoft’s website was hacked earlier this month as sensitive information including user names, e-mail addresses and encrypted passwords were all compromised. It’s worth pointing out that the two incidents don’t appear to be linked, however.
