TripAdvisor, one of the top travel review websites around, released a statement today that warns its members of a security breach that allowed the theft of a portion of their email list.  How large of a portion they don’t say, but we do know that the email list in question if over 20 million strong.

In the statement, TripAdvisor is quick to reassure people that no passwords were stolen, and since they do not take members’ credit card numbers, this breach doesn’t involve financial information.  They do warn, however, that some members might be getting some spam in the coming weeks.  They don’t go into any specific details about the attack, as they are still investigating.

From the statement:

What is TripAdvisor doing about this?
While we’re still investigating the details, we’ve identified the vulnerability, shut it down and are vigorously pursuing the matter with law enforcement. We are also are implementing additional security precautions to help prevent another incident in the future.

If you belong to TripAdvisor and are concerned your inbox might be getting a little spammy soon, they provide basic tips for avoiding spam such as activating your spam filter and deleting odd emails with misspellings and “alarmist messages.”

So if you believe you might be affected, be sure not to open
“zOMG FREE TriP 2 SPAIN BEZT EVER!!!!#@@!” when you get it.

In the email sent to registered members, CEO Steve Kaufer writes,

“The reason we are going directly to you with this news is that we think it’s the right thing to do.  As a TripAdvisor member, I would want to know.  Unfortunately, this sort of data theft is becoming more common across many industries, and we take it extremely seriously.”