Verizon knocks up to $350m off Yahoo acquisition price with deal to be signed in days

Desperate to sell, Yahoo agrees - and clears yet-another security lapse out of its closet

Verizon, the US telecoms company that owns AOL, has demanded a cut of between $250m and $350m to the price it is prepared to pay for the Yahoo online assets.

The price cut follows a string of disclosures over security breaches at the tarnished internet company, which Verizon fears has affected the value of the assets it is buying.

However, the terms of the new deal - which the New York Times claims will be "close to $300m" - will be announced within days. Under the revised terms, the two companies are expected to share legal responsibility and costs for the data breaches, claims the New York Times.

When the deal is completed, Yahoo's online properties, will be merged with Verizon's growing portfolio of miscellaneous web brands, which include AOL and the Huffington Post.

And, with that particular cat of the bag, Yahoo chose today to reveal yet another security breach affecting users of its Yahoo Mail, or Ymail, online email service.

According to Yahoo, a number of accounts may have been cracked as a result of a forged cookie security flaw. In other words, the attackers were able to access accounts simply by forging a Yahoo cookie and without the need for a password. The company says that it has contacted potentially affected account holders.

In a statement, the company said that its investigation had "identified user accounts for which we believe forged cookies were take or used". It added that it had invalidated the forced cookies so they cannot be re-used.

The news, though, was widely greeted with a resigned shrug.

"Yahoo said in its announcement that an ongoing forensic investigation suspects that the attacker had access to proprietary code to learn how to forge cookies," said Andy Norton, EMEA risk officer at security company SentinelOne.

He added: "This would show new behaviours other than just stealing user databases, the attackers have also looked at alternative methods to infiltrate Yahoo users accounts,"