If you received a racist email from security camera provider Ring, you're not alone. It appears that pranksters exploited the vendor’s sign-up system to send the hateful messages to users. Over the weekend, numerous social media users reported receiving the emails from the official ring.com domain at “verify.ring.com.” The emails were meant to confirm that the user has signed up for Ring’s online service, but names in the email were changed to a racist slur. A PCMag reporter also received one such email, which came from verify.ring.com, but through a Ring subsidiary in Amsterdam. A "Verify Now" button in the email can also be clicked to officially create the user account with Ring.The emails sparked concerns that Ring was hacked. But it looks like the pranksters simply exploited Ring’s sign-up form, which is openly available on the web. That form merely asks for a first name, last name, and email address before Ring sends a confirmation email to the user. Recommended by Our EditorsThis suggests the pranksters took a trove of stolen email addresses—which often circulate on hacker forums—and ran them through Ring’s sign-up page to spam out the racist emails. The emails were also spotted using different racial slurs in the name field. In a statement, Ring added: “We’re aware of an issue involving non-customers' emails being used without their knowledge to create Ring accounts. These accounts appear to have been created by an unauthorized actor who obtained email addresses from a source other than Ring.”Although no breach occurred, the racist emails are still creating worries that the prank could allow people to create a Ring account for them without their consent. However, Ring told PCMag: “We are deactivating these accounts.”In addition, Ring appears to have fixed the exploit in the sign-up system. Now confirmation emails from Ring will simply say, “Hi, Neighbor,” rather than add the name of the user who signed up. Ring also says no unauthorized access or impact to Ring customer accounts or information occurred. #did #ring #just #send #racist