Many big sites have started sending out password reset e-mails. This comes in the wake of hackers selling the login credentials of sites, including NetFlix, Tumblr, LinkedIn. Its good if you heed their advice and change your password to a strong one.

Just in case you receive an e-mail from Facebook or Netflix requesting you to change your password since it matches a credential from an earlier security breach, don’t take it as a phishing attack. Heed the advice.

According to Brian Krebs, an expert in cyber security, a couple of big companies including social networking sites and streaming services, tend to peruse data from security related breaches and match the login credential to the ones existing in their own database. If a match is found, they then request the user to change the password in order to keep hackers at bay.

This comes in the wake of news reports stating that hackers have sold millions of login credentials from sites, including, MySpace, Tumblr and LinkedIn.

As per Krebs, having scoured the log of the leaked login credentials, Netflix has begun sending out password reset mails. Netflix supposedly uses a tool, which it released in 2014, to comb through leaked log-ins.

So please treat these e-mails with due care and not as a phishing attempt and do ensure that you change your password to a strong one to include a jumble of characters, numbers and special characters.

Creating unique passwords for every site that demands logins is an excellent idea. Also remember to delete the accounts you don’t use anymore.