Last week one of our clients’ Google accounts was hacked, using their access ID and password combination which resulted in a new (fraudulent) campaign being set up on their account.
Thankfully Google were straight onto this and shut it down due to suspicious behaviour. However, we have now had to rebuild the campaigns that previously existed.
What’s of equal importance from the client’s perspective is that they may use the same valid ID/password combination on more than one service they use. If their local machine(s) have been compromised through virus infestation, key logger malware etc, then the security of any service using those combinations will also be jeopardy.
Google insist on knowing that any virus infestation has been cleared prior to re-instatement of service.
Clients are advised at all times to ensure up to date professional anti-virus software is being used on all devices being used to access Google or any other system.
Once you know that your devices are virus free, also make sure that your ID and passwords on all accounts are secure. We recommend using long combinations of letters, numbers and punctuation marks to ensure that passwords are more secure, and that your account is less likely to be compromised.
Adwords account breaches are rare (thankfully) but they are bad news when they happen, so do ensure you try and prevent this from happening at all.
