A SOLICITOR whose LinkedIn account was hacked, sending an email with a fraudulent link to his contacts, has issued an apology to everyone affected by the cyber criminals.

Philip McCabe, principal solicitor at McCabe and Co, based in the Market Place, Chippenham, realised that criminals had accessed his social account within minutes on February 14, after the email with a fraudulent link had been sent out.

“LinkedIn is quite often compromised apparently, and they managed to get hold of the email addresses of my contacts but strangely, no names or other data was breached,” he said.

“I realised within three or four minutes of it happening, so I shut everything down and called Microsoft to check if anything else had been done.

“Luckily all our servers were untouched so none of our clients were affected really.”

Mr McCabe, a security-conscious person who regularly changes his passwords and keeps a close eye on his business, sent out an email warning everyone in his contact book about the hack.

In an email seen by the Gazette, the solicitor wrote: “On Wednesday we were unfortunate victims of a cyberattack on LinkedIn, which was then used to send an email to some of our contacts.

“We acted swiftly to close the affected account and mitigate the situation, and we are currently conducting a thorough investigation into the cause of the security breach.

“There were no bogus emails sent from our servers. However, the fraudsters sent a spoof email that purported to be from McCabe and Co Solicitors asking you to click on a link.

“If you deleted the email straight away, you do not need to take any further action. If, however, you opened the email and entered your personal Microsoft login details, you may wish to change your password as an extra precaution. If you have been affected, Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience or confusion caused.”