Yahoo had information of its email hack 24 months ago, reports say

Emerging reports reveals that Yahoo had information of its email hack two years ago which compromised 500 million user accounts.

According to Re/Code, “Yahoo said in a regulatory filing that it had knowledge for two years that a ‘state-sponsored actor’ was hacking into its system.”

Indeed, the entire story broke late in September, but in its filing from Wednesday (coincidentally released the same day as election results); Yahoo acknowledged that the company knew of the hack in late 2014. Initially it had stated it was discovered in a recent investigation.

Read also: Kaspersky lodges complaint against Microsoft

This is just more bad news for the Sunnyvale Company as it moves closer to its acquisition by Verizon. The telecom is taking a closer second look at the massive deal — it stated that it knew nothing of this hack until just before Yahoo notified its user base.

Worst case here, Verizon may want to lower the price it pays, or could conceivably walk away from the entire thing. Verizon covets the massive Yahoo audience, and wants to expose them to its advertising. But if the user base dwindles due to lack of trust for Yahoo’s security, Verizon may decide the $4.8 billion deal isn’t what it was initially cracked up to be.

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