Some 140 million users of Aussie online design website Canva have had their data stolen by hackers, although the company says no passwords nor credit card details were accessed or taken.
However Canva has asked users to change their passwords as a 'precaution'. The company said, “As soon as we became aware, Canva immediately took steps to determine the nature and scope of the problem, and alerted law enforcement.
"We are working with a forensics team that specialises in these types of attacks and the FBI to diagnose exactly what happened and are putting processes in place to help prevent another attack. We are committed to protecting the data and privacy of all of our users and will be implementing every possible safeguard to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”
Canva is a remarkable success story, with the portal started by Australian woman Melanie Perkins six years ago, and now worth $1bn. Users on its site create ten new designs every second of every day.
It has just raised $100m for further expansion, and has just acquired stock photo companies Pexels and Pixabay. Perkins, her boyfriend at the time of the launch and a former Google exec are the main owners.