I've now gotten a third e-mail from eBay:
As we announced last week, because of the cyberattack on our corporate information network discovered earlier this month, we are now prompting all eBay users to change their passwords when they log in or before they complete a transaction.
We have no evidence that financial information was accessed or compromised, or that this attack affected PayPal accounts or any PayPal financial information, which is encrypted and stored on a separate secure network.
However, this attack compromised a database containing encrypted eBay user passwords. As always, we have strong protections in place for both buyers and sellers in the event of any unauthorized activity and we are applying additional security to protect our customers. As a precautionary step, we are also asking all users to change their passwords.
If you haven't yet changed your password, please do so now so that you can continue listing and doing business on eBay. Go to My eBay>Personal/Business Information>Account Information>Password>Edit. If you have more than one eBay account, you will need to change the password for each of them. If you changed your password on May 21 or later, we do not need you to take any additional action at this time.
If you used the same password for eBay and any other site, we encourage you to change your password on those sites, too. As a matter of best practice, the same password should never be used across multiple sites or accounts.
Additional protections for sellers with auction-style listings
We recognize that the password reset may temporarily interrupt the normal bidding process for buyers. We're taking additional steps to ensure successful transactions for sellers:
All listing and final value fees will be refunded automatically for auction-style listings that ended between 6:00 AM PDT on Wednesday, May 21, 2014, and 11:59 PM PDT on Wednesday, May 21, 2014. Sellers will see these credits on their June invoice.
Sellers can end any auction-style listings without penalty between 6:00 AM PDT on Wednesday, May 21, 2014, and 11:59 PM PDT on Saturday, May 31, 2014 and will receive a credit for all listing fees related to these listings on their June invoice.
Sellers can also cancel any transactions from auction-style listings that ended in a sale between 6:00 AM PDT on Wednesday, May 21, 2014, and 11:59 PM PDT on Saturday, May 31, provided the buyer paid with PayPal and we can verify through PayPal that the buyer's full payment has been refunded.
Final value and listing fees will be credited on sellers' June invoice and any associated defects or negative buyer feedback removed. These protections will be applied automatically. The transaction must be cancelled within the above timeframe to qualify for the credit and defect/feedback removal.
We will also be communicating with the winning bidder for any cancelled auction-style transaction during this time period to ensure they continue to have great buyer experiences on eBay.
We apologize for any inconvenience or concern this situation may cause. Nothing is more important to us than the security and trust of every customer in our global marketplace. We know you have high expectations of us, and we are committed to ensuring a safe and secure online experience for you on any connected device. More information and updates are available at info.ebayinc.com.
Thank you for selling on eBay.
Sincerely,
Michael Jones
Vice President Merchant Development
The highlighted part is important, because it clarifies that changing your p/w is mandatory, rather than just a suggestion.
PS, not to add insult to injury, but I too wondered why you decided to decompress that questionable zip attachment. Perhaps this is your year of living dangerously...
I was born on a burning bridge, and I've lived dangerously all my life; life without an edge isn't life.
Heck, I had no more to lose than time, and lord knows I've got more of that than I know what to do with.
