There were approximately 5,500 accounts displayed for each letter. Assuming the attackers have a similar number of accounts for each letter of the alphabet, it suggests a total number of compromised accounts somewhere around 143,000.

It was initially thought that the information may have been leaked or stolen directly from the is hosted. However, based on the mathematical inferences above, the total number of accounts stolen only represents about 3.5 percent of the over 400 million registered Hotmail accounts.

According to Computerworld, a Microsoft spokeswoman stated "We determined that this was not a breach of and initiated our standard process of working to help customers regain control of their accounts" in an e-mail response.

Assuming that is true, the next most logical choice on the Occam's Razor flowchart of data breach troubleshooting suggests that the information was gathered via a phishing attack. If so, it would be one of the largest such phishing attacks in terms of the total number of accounts compromised.

Here are 5 simple steps you can follow to avoid becoming a victim of a phishing attack: