A data leak from a pirate mega-file on 1.2 billion Internet users

The month of November will end with the discovery of one of the most impressive web files of the year.

We are talking about a mega file, which would contain personal data that would be estimated to belong to 1.2 billion visitors to the web.

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The discovery was made by a computer security researcher named Vinny Troia. This gigantic database contains several links to access millions of accounts, Twitter and Facebook, not to mention associated phone numbers. In this way, he recommended that everyone check this database to make sure that they were not among the people involved. According to the computer security researcher who discovered this file, this database would be available on a search engine specifically dedicated to the Internet of Things, a search engine called Shodan. These pirated documents would weigh about 4 terabytes, of all this would be only personal data. anyone who wants to know can go to their search engine to see if they are among the victims of this huge hack.

According to Vinny Troia, the researcher, after analyzing these mega-files: "No identifiers, passwords, or bank details are inscribed. On the other hand, this huge database contains millions of links to Facebook and Twitter accounts, as well as the phone numbers associated with those accounts. Problem, these user profiles and phone details can easily be hijacked by hackers, especially to launch large-scale phishing operations. ».

Indeed, on closer analysis, we realize that hackers who orchestrated the famous Auchan voucher scam, in possession of this kind of data, could easily manage to mount new schemes based on your preferences. fake advertisements or fake forms can easily circulate in this type of position. With so much data gathered, it would be easy for a hacker to find users' secret questions which would allow them to easily access the account.

But the question still arises as to the origin of this mega file. according to our computer security researcher: "All this personal information could have been gleaned via data broker files or, in other words, consumer data sellers. These companies sell data recovered from the net to the highest bidders. Very often, companies use this information to do targeted advertising, for example. ». The computer security expert then discovered, following some research he conducted, that some of the companies concerned with what he had just explained were based in the United States specifically in California, in San Francisco.

One of these companies, called People Data Labs, is believed to have the personal data of more than 1 billion people. Data consisting of Twitter's Facebook account linkedin profile or email address. However, despite all these negotiations, it would be literally impossible to say exactly how this data could be found on the internet. It could be that these companies, which specialize in collecting personal data online, may have been at least a few of them, the victims of a security flaw allowing the leakage of all its data.

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