Ashley Madison owner says site still adding users after data hack

TORONTO, Aug 31 (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of people
signed up for infidelity website Ashley Madison in the last
week, parent company Avid Life Media said on Monday, even after
hackers leaked data about millions of its clients.
The company also struck back at reports that the site had
few genuine female users, saying internal data released by
hackers had been incorrectly analyzed.
"Recent media reports predicting the imminent demise of
Ashley Madison are greatly exaggerated," the company said in a
statement. "Despite having our business and customers attacked,
we are growing."
On Aug. 18, hackers who claimed to be unhappy with Avid
Life's business practices released Ashley Madison customer data.
A second data dump contained thousands of emails and other
company documents. Reuters has not independently verified the
authenticity of the data, emails or documents.
Last week, tech blog Gizmodo published a widely cited
analysis of the customer data. It said thousands of users had
listed email addresses that ended with ashleymadison.com and
that very few, about 1,500, female members had ever checked the
site for messages.
Avid Life said on Monday that an unnamed reporter had
wrongly concluded that the number of active female members on
Ashley Madison could be calculated based on assumptions about
the meaning of fields contained in the leaked data.
"Last week alone, women sent more than 2.8 million messages
within our platform," Avid Life said, adding that 87,596 women
had also signed up for Ashley Madison last week.
On Friday, Avid Life said Chief Executive Officer Noel
Biderman had left the company by mutual agreement.
For at least three years before the publication of details
about its members, Avid Life had been struggling to sell itself
or raise funds, according to internal documents and emails that
hackers also released.