Ooooh shit - STEAM's been hacked.

Steam - one of the world's largest distribution networks for online video games - has been hacked, leaving the user accounts of 35 million vulnerable and potentially exposing their credit card details and billing address to hackers.

It follows the prominent hacking of Sony's PlayStation network in April, which affected 77 million accounts globally, 1.5 million which were Australian.

Valve, the company behind Steam, issued a message to users informing them of the breach today. In it company head Gabe Newell said its online forums were defaced on Sunday November 6 in the US and that on further investigation it found that the intrusion went "beyond the Steam forums".

The company learned, he said, that the intruders also obtained access to a Steam database which contained "information including user names, hashed and salted passwords, game purchases, email addresses, billing addresses and encrypted credit card information".

As yet there was no evidence that encrypted credit card numbers or personally identifying information was taken by the intruders, or that the protection on credit card numbers or passwords was cracked, Mr Newell said, but added that the company was still investigating. "We don't have evidence of credit card misuse at this time. Nonetheless you should watch your credit card activity and statements closely."