A group of hackers threatens to hack 250 million iCloud accounts by April 7 unless Apple pays a ransom of at least $700,000. Calling itself "the Turkish Crime Family", the group claimed that it has access to millions of Apple accounts and passwords, and will begin resetting them as well as remotely wiping iPhones unless the ransom is paid. While it’s hard to tell how legitimate the threat is, now is the perfect time to learn how to lock down your account.

Apple said in a statement that the alleged list of email addresses and passwords look like they have been obtained from compromised third-party services. However, it has been verified by ZDNet that the hacker group has at least 54 valid accounts with passwords. What's more alarming is that three of those users insist that their password was unique to iCloud.

Apple said that it is working with law enforcement officials to avoid massive iCloud breaches, and also to identify the hackers as soon as possible. However, the best way to gain a peace of mind is to know how to protect your account, and any other accounts, by using these 3 easy steps. The first one is the easiest, quickest and most straightforward course of action: change your password to something new and original, the CNET reported.

The way to do this is to make sure that a user's password has at least 16 characters with combinations of numbers, symbols, upper and lowercase letters, and spaces. Also, don't repeat the words, don't use usernames, pronouns, and any other predefined number or letter patterns. Finally, avoid recycling any passwords from the past.

The second way to protect your iCloud from hackers is by turning on two-factor authentication, also called 2FA or 2-step verification. According to Wired, this is about as close to being fully locked-down as you can get by getting a confirmation code on your other devices that you've pre-authorized for verification. Finally, always use a password manager to increase protection and create the perfect password.