Virgin Media - Your plain text passwords are safe with us

Re:Virgin Media - Your plain text passwords are safe with us by jbrooksuk on Monday July 29, 2013 @04:30AM (#6119939)

There is a reply from someone called @Kaithar (https://twitter.com/Kaithar/status/361765029848170496) which says "actually, DPA does mean they need to be able to read your account password, the one setup for over-the-phone auth"

Surely that can't be true? DPA shouldn't give them the ability to read our passwords, only the ability to save DOB, payment type (direct-debit etc) so you can validate that. But not passwords.

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Re:Virgin Media - Your plain text passwords are safe with us by kfullert on Monday July 29, 2013 @04:36AM (#6119959)

I think they need to store your "memorable name" in plain-text for DPA purposes (so they can confirm they're talking to the account holder) but passwords for e-mail/billing etc. online have no need to be plain-text

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Re:Virgin Media - Your plain text passwords are safe with us by jbrooksuk on Monday July 29, 2013 @04:43AM (#6119979)

Well, when I signed up online to their service I created a password. A few months later I went to login to figure out why our bill was so much but apparently the account wasn't working. I rang them, didn't remember setting a "phone password" so reset it then they said "Oh your password has been blahblahblah and blahblooblah before". But I'd only have used them online. And since I didn't remember setting it because they didn't offer me a "memorable question" reset. They just read my online passwords out to me.

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