One word you’ve probably heard in abundance since last week (technically two words) is Heartbleed, the internet bug that has caused its fair share of chaos among the denizens of the web.  

For those not sure what the particular issue is, Heartbleed is a security flaw in OpenSSL (Secure Sockets Layer) software that lets someone with access view all the data server’s memory.  SSL software is a basic web encryption that stops other users from knowing what you’re writing and saying online.  In fact, it’s such a ubiquitous function that internet research firm Netcraft, the number of websites affected is somewhere around 500,000.  The nature of this security weakness means that third-party users could potential intercept usernames, passwords, and credit card information.  

Luckily, security firm Codenomicon and Google researcher Neel Mehta both discovered the bug last week and people are being notified before any real damage gets done.  There are a lot of lists of afftected websites, and users are being strongly encouraged (read: if you don’t you’re asking for some trouble) to change their passwords and log-in info on those sites, although to be extra safe, you should really update all your passwords if you haven’t done so recently.  

Via: CNet