Our data breach incident response team works with clients to build a timely, comprehensive & compliant response plan to mitigate data loss. They have done some research and came up with the following. The Incident response team assist clients with data breach response plan, which provides a roadmap your organization can follow in the event a data breach is discovered.
Largest data breaches?
LinkedIn | 117 million
Cybercriminals absconded with email addresses and encrypted passwords for 117 million LinkedIn users in this 2012 data breach. The passwords were encrypted, right? No big deal. Unfortunately, LinkedIn used that darn SHA1 encryption we talked about earlier. And if you have any doubts that your stolen passwords are being decrypted, CyberSecOp News reported on hacked LinkedIn accounts being used in an InMail phishing campaign. These InMail messages contained malicious URLs that linked to a website spoofed to look like a Google Docs login page by which cybercriminals harvested Google usernames and passwords. Still better than that temp-to-perm ditch-digging job recruiters keep sending you.
eBay | 145 million
In early 2014, cybercriminals clicked “Steal It Now” when they broke into the network of the popular online auction site and pinched the passwords, email addresses, birth dates, and physical addresses for 145 million users. One positive takeaway, financial information from sister site PayPal was stored separately from user information in a practice known as network segmentation (more on that later). This had the effect of limiting the attack and prevent criminals from getting to the really sensitive payment info.
Equifax | 145.5 million
The credit reporting company Equifax took a hard hit to their own “credit” score, at least in the eyes of American consumers, when the company announced they had experienced a data breach back in 2017. All of this could have been avoided if Equifax just kept their software up-to-date. Instead, hackers were able to take advantage of a well-known software bug and hack into the underlying software supporting the Equifax website. What makes the Equifax data breach so awful is not the size, though considerable; rather, it’s the value of the information stolen. The perpetrators made off with the names, birthdates, Social Security numbers, addresses, and drivers license numbers for 145.5 million Americans. Add to that approximately 200,000 credit card numbers and you get one of the worst data breaches in terms of sensitivity of the compromised data.
Under Armour | 150 million
Sports apparel company Under Armour’s slogan is “Protect This House.” Apparently, they didn’t take their own advice when their diet and exercise app MyFitnessPal was hacked in February of 2018. In the attack, cybercriminals managed to steal the usernames, emails and encrypted passwords for 150 million users. Under Armour did well to announce the data breach within a week of its discovery. On the flip side, the company used weak SHA1 encryption on some of the stolen passwords, meaning criminals could crack the passwords and reuse them on other popular websites.
Exactis | 340 million
The Exactis data breach is a little different in the sense that there’s no proof cybercriminals stole any data. However, the cybersecurity researcher who discovered the “data breach” believes that criminals did. Speaking with Wired, Vinny Troia said, “I’d be surprised if someone else didn't already have this.” Exactis, a Florida-based marketing firm, had records for 340 million Americans (that’s every single US citizen) stored on an unsecure server. Any cybercriminal could have found the data using a special search engine called Shodan that lets users find Internet-connected devices. While the breach did not include data like credit card and Social Security numbers it did include detailed lifestyle information, like religion and hobbies, that could be used in phishing attacks.
Myspace | 360 million
Remember Myspace? The social networking site that came before Facebook? If you had a Myspace account and you reuse passwords from site-to-site, you may be at risk. Cybercriminals stole data on 360 million pre-2013 Myspace users. This may not seem like a big deal, but the stolen passwords used that weak SHA1 encryption we keep talking about. As mentioned previously, criminals can try and reuse your old passwords on other popular sites in a credential stuffing attack.
AdultFriendFinder | 412 million
You’d think a site like AdultFriendFinder, billed as the “World’s Largest Sex and Swinger Community,” would know to use protection. Instead cybercriminals penetrated the site’s defenses and stole usernames, encrypted passwords, emails, date of last visit, and membership status for 412 million accounts. A previous data breach at AdultFriendFinder, affecting 4 million users, included sexual preference and whether or not the user was looking for an extramarital affair. Yikes.
Yahoo | 500 million
Yahoo? More like oh no! Yahoo makes its first appearance on our countdown with the 2014 attack on the former Internet tech giant. At its height during the dot-com boom years, Yahoo was one of the most visited sites on the web. This huge attack surface caught the attention of various bad actors. In the attack, cybercriminals made off with the personal information for as many as 500 million Yahoo users. In 2017, the US Department of Justice filed charges against four Russian nationals in connection with the Yahoo attack, two of whom were Russian government officials. To date, only one of the Russians has seen the inside of a jail cell.
Marriott International | 500 million
Just like housekeeping, hackers ignored the “Do Not Disturb Sign” and caught the world’s largest hotel company Marriott International in a compromising situation. The 2014 Starwood-Marriott attack wasn’t discovered until September of 2018. During the intervening years cybercriminals had unrestricted access to the personal information of 500 million Starwood-Marriott customers—anyone who ever booked a reservation at a Starwood property—including names, mailing addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, passport numbers, and dates of birth.
Yahoo—again | 3 billion
Yahoo has the embarrassing distinction of being the only company to make our list of biggest data breaches twice. To add insult to injury, Yahoo also takes the top spot. In August of 2013, cybercriminals stole data on every Yahoo user in the world—all three billion of them. The sheer size of the data breach is difficult to fathom. Over one-third of the world’s population was affected. When the attack was first revealed in 2016, Yahoo claimed only one billion of its users were affected by the data breach, later changing the figure to “all Yahoo user accounts” less than a year later. The timing couldn’t have been worse. At the time Yahoo revealed the updated data breach numbers, the company was in negotiations to be acquired by Verizon. News of the data breach allowed Verizon to scoop up Yahoo at a fire sale price. Yahoo was acquired by Verizon in 2017.
Popular Ransomware:
Ryuk: Ryuk the new ransomware in town that’s very carefully targeting enterprise and businesses. Say hello to Ryuk. In the first two weeks after its August debut, the ransomware has made their cyber attackers over $640,000 USD. By contrast, SamSam has taken about three years to make its author about $6 million USD.
Dharma: Dharma ransomware appeared as early as 2006, and has continued to this day with regular updates. Because of the continuous evolution of this ransomware, free decryptors for previous malware versions were released by Kaspersky and Eset. Unfortunately, files encrypted with the new variants of Dharma ransomware are not currently decryptable for free as was the case for the older variants.
LeChiffre: "Le Chiffre", which comes from the French noun "chiffrement" meaning "encryption", is the main villain from James Bond's Casino Royale novel who kidnaps Bond's love interest to lure him into a trap and steal his money. Unlike other variants, hackers must run LeChiffre manually on the compromised system. Cyber criminals automatically scan networks in search of poorly secured remote desktops, logging into them remotely and manually running an instance of the virus.
Locky: Locky's approach is similar to many other types of ransomware. The malware is spread in an email message disguised as an invoice. When opened, the invoice is scrambled and the victim is instructed to enable macros to read the document. When macros are enabled, Locky begins encrypting a large array of file types using AES encryption.
NotPetya: Initial reports categorized NotPetya as a variant of Petya, a strain of ransomware first seen in 2016. However, researchers now believe NotPetya is instead a malware known as a wiper with a sole purpose of destroying data instead of obtaining a ransom.
Petya: Unlike some other types of ransomware, Petya encrypts entire computer systems. Petya overwrites the master boot record, rendering the operating system unbootable.
Spider: A form of ransomware spread via spam emails across Europe. Spider ransomware is hidden in Microsoft Word documents that install the malware on a victim’s computer when downloaded. The Word document, which is disguised as a debt collection notice, contains malicious macros. When these macros are executed, the ransomware begins to download and encrypt the victim's data.
TeslaCrypt: TeslaCrypt is another new type of ransomware on the scene. Like most of the other examples here, it uses an AES algorithm to encrypt files. It's typically distributed via the Angler exploit kit specifically attacking Adobe vulnerabilities. Once a vulnerability is exploited, TeslaCrypt installs itself in the Microsoft temp folder.
TorrentLocker: TorrentLocker is typically distributed through spam email campaigns and is geographically targeted with email messages delivered to specific regions. TorrentLocker is often referred to as CryptoLocker, and it uses an AES algorithm to encrypt file types. In addition to encoding files, it also collects email addresses from the victim’s address book to spread malware beyond the initially infected computer—this is unique to TorrentLocker.
WannaCry: WannaCry is a widespread ransomware campaign that is affecting organizations across the globe. The ransomware hit over 125,000 organizations in over 150 countries. The ransomware strain is also known as WCry or WanaCrypt0r and currently affects Windows machines through a Microsoft exploit known as EternalBlue.
ZCryptor: ZCryptor is a self-propagating malware strain that exhibits worm-like behavior, encrypting files and also infecting external drives and flash drives so it can be distributed to other computers.
SamSam: SamSam ransomware is a custom infection used in targeted attacks, often deployed using a wide range of exploits or brute-force tactics. Based on our own run-ins with the infection, we’ve observed that attacks were made on targets via vulnerable JBoss, and RDP host servers during a previous wave of SamSam attacks in 2016 and 2017.
KeyPass: KeyPass ransomware first appeared on 8 August and so far has spread to hundreds of victims in more than 20 countries around the world via fake software installers which download the ransomware onto the victim's PC.
