Heartbleed update

April 14, 2014
5 minutes read

This is an update to an earlier blog post about the Heartbleed bug.

tl;dr – Wave was not compromised by Heartbleed and neither were our critical technology partners.

As promised, here’s an update on the Heartbleed bug and what we’ve been up to in response to it.

As soon as the Heartbleed bug was announced, we knew and reported immediately that Wave’s systems were not directly vulnerable. More specifically, the version of OpenSSL used by Wave was not a version that was subject to the Heartbleed bug.

Next step: Confirm with our critical partners whether they had been impacted — in other words, find out if Wave was indirectlyvulnerable. Happily, we can report that our hosting provider was not vulnerable to the bug, and our bank data partners report no problems as well.

After that, out of an overabundance of caution, we compiled a massive list of every service we use, and made sure that all of them were safe to use again. And we changed all our passwords, across our entire organization.

For any company that couldn’t provide the right assurances that they were safe to use, we have suspended their use pending their further actions. Fret not, this has no impact on Wave customers: The only companies in this bucket are tools for administrative use, like meeting planning or screen sharing.

What should YOU do?

You’re reading this blog post about Heartbleed, so we’re off to a good start. In my last post I suggested you follow an action plan similar to what we did:

  1. Think of all the services you use online (the size of this list may surprise you by the time you’re finished).
  2. Systematically go through each one and verify if they were affected or not.
  3. If they were affected, verify that they’ve fixed the vulnerability and then change your passwords.

Most sites that were impacted by Heartbleed are reaching out to their users to tell them to change their passwords. If you haven’t received something from a company, don’t be afraid of reaching out proactively. The person best suited to protecting you is you. (Also, I hear you’re pretty good at preventing forest fires.)

Are you done, then? No! I strongly recommend that you be extra diligent over the coming months. Watch out for phishing emails saying things like, “Hey Jim, I forgot to pay you back for that thing I bought — send me your bank credentials so that I can wire you some money.” If you get messages that ask for or talk about your money and you’re not sure about the source, treat it with caution. For example, your bank wouldn’t actually send you to a site like TD.passwordreset.12312312343.cn.com to change your credentials. If you’re resetting a password, make sure you see the https in front of a URL you recognize. If you’re following links from one page to another, verify that you actually ended up where you were headed, not a page that just looks like it.

In closing:

You’ll hear this from time to time: Here at Wave we take security very seriously. That’s not a canned response. We mean it. Part of our commitment is being open and honest, even when the news isn’t great. For many of you, your business is your life. We understand that, we respect it, and we’ll continue to treat events like these as life-threatening.

Finishing where I started, though: I’ll reiterate that Wave and our critical technology partners were not affected by the Heartbleed bug.

So you can…

keep calm and carry the one

(a little accounting humor to lighten up a dry subject)

starter
Plan
starter
Plan
$0
pro
Plan
$16USD
$20CAD/mo
Option to accept online payments
Starting at
2.9% + $0.60
per credit card transaction
Starting at
2.9% + $0*
per credit card transaction
for first 10 transactions/mo
Unlimited invoices, estimates, bills
Add your logo and brand colors
Automate late payment reminders
with online payments
Wave mobile app
Unlimited bookkeeping records
Dashboard and reports
Auto-import transactions
Auto-merge transactions
Auto-categorize transactions
Add users
Live-person chat and email support
with any paid add-on
Digitally capture unlimited receipts
additional fee
Payroll
additional fee
additional fee
Hire a bookkeeper
additional fee
additional fee
Option to accept online payments
Starting at
2.9% + $0.60
per credit card transaction
Starting at
2.9% + $0*
per credit card transaction
for first 10 transactions/mo
Unlimited invoices, estimates, bills
Add your logo and brand colors
Automate late payment reminders
with online payments
Wave mobile app
Unlimited bookkeeping records
Dashboard and reports
Auto-import transactions
Auto-merge transactions
Auto-categorize transactions
Add users
Live-person chat and email support
with any paid add-on
Digitally capture unlimited receipts
additional fee
Payroll
additional fee
additional fee
Hire a bookkeeper
additional fee
additional fee

*While subscribed to Wave’s Pro Plan, get 2.9% + $0 (Visa, Mastercard, Discover) and 3.4% + $0 (Amex) per transaction for unlimited transactions during the offer period. After the offer ends: over 10 transactions per month at 2.9% + $0.60 (Visa, Mastercard, Discover) and 3.4% + $0.60 (Amex) per transaction. Discover processing is only available to US customers. See full terms and conditions.

See Terms of Service for more information.

By Brian Masson
Categories:

The information and tips shared on this blog are meant to be used as learning and personal development tools as you launch, run and grow your business. While a good place to start, these articles should not take the place of personalized advice from professionals. As our lawyers would say: “All content on Wave’s blog is intended for informational purposes only. It should not be considered legal or financial advice.” Additionally, Wave is the legal copyright holder of all materials on the blog, and others cannot re-use or publish it without our written consent.

Create your Wave account today.

Let's do this