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After an Apple News feed hack, Fast Company takes down its website

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Fast Company, a US-based business news publication, stated on Wednesday that two racist offensive push notifications were delivered to consumers via its Apple News alerts as a result of a high-profile media feed hack.

Fast Company
Image Source: economictimes.indiatimes.com

As soon as the situation was rectified, Apple took down the Fast Company channel from its platform. In order to offer push alerts to Apple consumers who subscribe to the news publisher’s channel, news publishers utilizing the Apple News aggregation application can link existing digital publishing tools to Apple News.

Fast Company claims that such publishing tools were compromised by hackers. Two offensive and racist push notifications were sent by hackers one minute apart, according to a tweet from Fast Company, which also stated that the Apple News stream had been suspended while the problem was examined.

Before it vanished, the hackers left a statement on Fast Company’s website explaining how they gained access by using a password that was used by numerous users, including an administrator.

The hackers gave the following message, “Wow, Fast Company. Despite the public defacement of your site, which boasts millions of visitors, all you did was hastily change your database credentials, disable outside connections to the database server, and fix the articles. What an absolute disgrace of a news source, and one that I would personally avoid due to how little they care about user security.”

The hacker behind the intrusion, who goes by the handle “Thrax,” however, released a sponsored content article before the site was taken down that described how the attackers were able to hack the magazine. According to the message, Fast Company had login details that were “ridiculously easy” and used on numerous accounts, such as an administrator.

The hacker was able to send out emails using any @fastcompany.com email thanks to the attacker’s access to a variety of sensitive data, namely authentication tokens, Apple News API credentials, and Amazon Simple Email Service (SES) tokens. The Fast Company hacker stated they were unable to access client records because they were probably kept in a database server.

The hacker claims to have earlier compromised the photo-sharing portal ClickASnap and the self-described free-speech social media platform USA Life. In a separate message posted on Sunday to a well-known hacking forum, the attacker stated they were going to release a database with 6,737 Fast Company employee information. This database included information on the employees’ email accounts, password hashes, unpublished drafts, etc.

Reuters attempted to access the Fast Company website on Tuesday night, but it was unavailable and the page gave a 404 error. Following the shutdown, Fast Company claimed that the notifications were sent using a hack of its content management system, which is used by news organizations to publish and maintain their stories.

Business, technology, and design are the main topics of the American business magazine Fast Company. It is accessible online and in print. Six print issues are published each year. Fast Company is owned by the publishing firm Mansueto Ventures LLC.

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Fast Company – Spreading Business News Around The Globe

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We have become so engrossed in our daily life that somehow we have to make time for everything. Our world is lucky enough that the era of digitalization has already made our life easier. In recent days, the habit of the newspaper is eventually changing to swiping news in our smartphones. Digital magazines are also available these days for enriching us with news and entertainment.

Speaking of magazines, many people have the habit of carrying one and reading whenever they get spare time. It is very important to follow up with current affairs especially technology and business. Fast Company is one such American business magazine that publishes both hard copies and available online for us. It is a monthly magazine that brings us the news from all over the world.

Bill Taylor and Alan Webber founded the company in 1995 and since then it has become more than just news provider. The domain of the content of Fast Company’s magazine is exclusively about the topics that we should be aware of. It includes technology, innovations, and people that are bringing a change to our world, nourishing creativity, etc.

About the Founders

Bill Taylor went to Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School to acquire his bachelor’s degree. He graduated in 1982 and in 1985 he went to MIT Sloan School of Management for acquiring his MBA. Bill’s career life started with Harvard Business Review. He joined it in 1987 as Associate Editor. In 1993, he started working on the project of Fast Company Magazine and officially released it in 1995. Currently, he is the author of Simply Brilliant which he joined in 2011.

Alan Webber completed his schooling from DeMun School at Clayton followed by St. Louis Country Day School. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English from Amherst College. After graduating, he went to Harvard Business School as an employee and later joined The Oregon Times. Alan also gained experience in the political career while he served as a policy advisor to the mayor of Portland.

Apart from his career in the political background, he is well-known as the co-founder of Fast Company. In 1999, he became Adweek’s Editor of the Year.

The Idea

Bill Taylor spotted the opportunity from the perspective of technology. When they decided to establish the company, the internet just started decentralizing the entire idea of computing. Gigantic developments were taking place in the world of telecommunication and networking. On the other hand, Webber looked at it to showcase in front of the population that how the world is changing. Connecting everything from politics to business, from the government to globalization, they co-founded Fast Company.

The Beginning

Economy, politics, and the internal affairs of the government are the foundation of a nation. While Bill Taylor excelled in the sphere of advocacy work and managing business, Webber was a busy curving niche in the political dimension. This made them the perfect duo as the founding member of the Fast Company. A magazine published by a politically and economically experienced team. They worked together for a long time and known each other well.

They started working for it in 1993. Initially, they were able to raise $550,000 from eleven investors. The fund was raised for investing in a prototype. This took almost a year but they took the risk.

Further Story

After a couple of years it started publishing, the company launched an online social network, “Company of Friends”. By 2003, it attracted more than 40,000 members from 120 different cities. In 2000, the company was sold for $550 million and after that, the dot com bubble affected it hugely. But, it eventually started recovering under the leadership of John A. Byrne.

In 2005, Mansueto Ventures bought both Fast Company and Inc magazine for $35 million. Since then the company continues its operations under Mansueto.

Future Aspects

When Fast Company started publishing it only had a handful of competitors. But, after the dot com bust, the recovery was questionable. Fast Company though known as one of the leading American magazines is not the best advertising platform. But, it has a reputation for publishing quality content valuable to the readers. So, the company is looking forward to engaging customers with its content.

Currently, Stephanie Mehta is the Editor of Fast Company and the magazine is published eight times a year.