Avenza maps - hacking accounts

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Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by bladeracer » 26 Jan 2022, 4:04 pm

I got 19 emails this afternoon saying I had downloaded maps of Indonesia.
Avenza downloads.JPG
Avenza downloads.JPG (103.63 KiB) Viewed 2143 times

My phone was not online and these maps are not on my phone.
Logging into my Avenza account though confirms I did indeed download them.
There are no fees I'm aware of but it is a concern that people can use my account to download maps to their phone.

Trying to report it to Avenza is virtually impossible, I can find no way of making any contact with the company at all.

So, just warning other users that it is a possibility.
I can't fathom any actual detriment to myself though.
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by Larry » 26 Jan 2022, 5:21 pm

Hopefully you don not use the same username and password for multiple sites as the hackers must have got these for this site.
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by bladeracer » 26 Jan 2022, 5:37 pm

Larry wrote:Hopefully you don not use the same username and password for multiple sites as the hackers must have got these for this site.


Nope, one-off account.
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by disco stu » 26 Jan 2022, 7:49 pm

Cheers for the heads up
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by bladeracer » 26 Jan 2022, 10:09 pm

Another bunch later on today.
Avenza downloads 2.JPG
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I just changed the password again.
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by disco stu » 27 Jan 2022, 1:01 pm

So they got straight back in even though you just changed password?
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by bladeracer » 27 Jan 2022, 1:15 pm

disco stu wrote:So they got straight back in even though you just changed password?


I haven't logged back in to Avenza to confirm these were actually downloaded but I assume they were.
I can only guess there's a flaw in Avenza's security? As there's no money involved in buying maps they possibly don't put much effort into securing our data, just my guess though. Worth keeping in mind if you sign up to them to use a one-off username and password.

It would also be nice if they had some way their customers could actually discuss this stuff with them...
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by disco stu » 27 Jan 2022, 5:34 pm

Yeah, pretty bad if you can't contact them.

The subscription they charge isn't cheap either for a non commercial user, so you would think they would be better
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Re: Avenza maps - hacking accounts

Post by bladeracer » 27 Jan 2022, 6:03 pm

disco stu wrote:Yeah, pretty bad if you can't contact them.

The subscription they charge isn't cheap either for a non commercial user, so you would think they would be better


I pay the donation for the free map bundles to save downloading them individually, but I don't pay any subscription.
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