The databases were stolen in early August, according to breach notification site Leaked Source.com, which obtained a copy of the databases.

The hackers' names aren't known, but they used known SQL injection vulnerabilities found in older v Bulletin forum software to get access to the databases.

Scamming even has a more colorful and "patriotic" name duping the riches. Of course, one needs to lull the conscience scammers sleep badly, as is well-known.

Over 25 million accounts associated with forums hosted by Russian internet giant have been stolen by hackers.

And now it is not just a 'Boris The Blade' here and a Sergey there , "scamming" has become quite a large crime industry, where street-smart but not very ethical enterpreneurs rent office space, buy computers and supplies, and hire students with English skills to write and send scam letters. In all this one can even see some justice as if a weak one beats a strong one, a poor one wins over a rich one.

And quite soon an interested person from America, Canada, Britain or any other country finds out that a ukrainian girl named Elena has always dreamt about him in some russian nook. Right becomes sure that it is love sent him by God.

Sometimes such messages appear in your inbox out of nowhere, even if you do not have a profile on any dating site.

A member of the Leaked Source group told me that about half of the passwords -- around 12 million -- were easily cracked using readily available cracking tools.

That's because, according to the group's blog post, the sites "all used some variation of MD5 with or without unique salts," an algorithm that is considered insecure by today's standards.