User KeysCapt writes in: "Researchers using 200 PlayStation 3's, a sophisticated attack on the ailing MD5 hash algorithm, and a slip-up by Verisign claim to have found a method of hacking any website, in the interest of improving web security. As a result Verisign says it's stopped using MD5, as of around noon Pacific time December 30. "We're disappointed that these researchers did not share their results with us earlier," writes Verisign's Tim Callan, "but we're happy to report that we have completely mitigated this attack."

Some additional discussion of this can be found in our security forum. Princeton Professor Ed Felten has a good layman's explanation of what the discovery means. Resident security expert Steve Friedl offers up his guide to cryptographic hashes. The actual research note can be found here, while a response by Verisign's Tim Callan can be found here.