It's a good time to change your passwords.
I'm Bridget Carey and this is your CNET Update.
It's time to double check that your antivirus software is up to date because hackers have stolen usernames and passwords for nearly 2 million accounts including passwords from Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Twitter.
Hackers are gathering the data using computers infected with the virus that records
keystrokes and it tracked logging credentials over the past month for all sorts of websites and services.
Credit for the discovery goes to cyber security firm Trustwave.
Most of the attacks were outside of the US, but to be on the safe side you should update your antivirus software and downloading your patches and updates for your browsers.
If you pay full price for a smartphone AT&T will now cut you some slack on your monthly service bill.
AT&T is changing its mobile share plans to lower the costs of data
for customers that rather pay in full for a phone instead of getting the discounted subsidized price with the 2-year contract.
Bills are also less for those that bring in their own phone and for those that use the monthly installment plan.
Both T-Mobile and Sprint already do a similar thing for their customers, but now AT&T is following suit.
Verizon is the odd one out.
It offers an Edge plan that lets you pay for a phone over time, but it does not lower its service charge to make it worth it.
You see when you get a phone at a
discounted $200 price, you're really paying for the $600 phone over time with your service bill.
Google added a new tool that lets you download your calendar appointments into a zip file.
It's helpful if you need to back up or export your Google calendar into another service like Yahoo, Outlook, or iCalendar.
Google said soon you'll also be able to back up your Gmail.
Looking ahead to next week Instagram is having a press event on December 12th to announce something and with the invitation.
The company
sent this 4-inch square block with a photo printed on it and you can hang it on a wall.
A couple of us got these and they're just random photos so perhaps Instagram is hinting that there will be a service where you can print out your photos and turn it into art.
If so, I sure hope the quality isn't as bad as the ones we got.
The photo here is grainy but maybe it's because of the filter used.
There have been reports suggesting that the Facebook-owned Instagram is working on a private messaging service
so that could also be announced at the event.
That's your tech news update but you can find more details at CNET.com/Update and be sure to follow along on Twitter for the latest.
From our studios in New York I'm Bridget Carey.
