Hackers post data stolen from cheating website Ashley Madison

NEW YORK -- Data stolen from the infidelity website Ashley Madison has been posted online by hackers.

The hackers dumped the names, addresses and credit card information of 32 million users to a part of the web only available through a special browser called "Tor."

Ashley Madison is a website where married men and women set up extramarital affairs. Detailed descriptions of what users were seeking was also posted.

Toronto-based Avid Life Media Inc., the parent company of Ashley Madison, hired a technology security firm after the website was hacked last month and data was posted online. The company and law enforcement are investigating.

"This event is not an act of hacktivism, it is an act of criminality," Avid Life said in a statement. "The criminal, or criminals, involved in this act have appointed themselves as the moral judge, juror, and executioner, seeing fit to impose a personal notion of virtue on all of society. We will not sit idly by and allow these thieves to force their personal ideology on citizens around the world. We are continuing to fully cooperate with law enforcement to seek to hold the guilty parties accountable to the strictest measures of the law."

The breach was first reported by Brian Krebs of Krebs on Security, a website that focuses on cybersecurity.

Avid Life, which also operates matchmaking websites under the CougarLife and Established Men brands, says it has 40 million members around the world.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.