Massive data leak exposes over 26 bln records

Cybersecurity researcher Bob Dyachenko and the Cybernews team have unveiled a massive data leak, referred to as the 'Mother of all Breaches' (MOAB), containing 12 terabytes of information encompassing 26 billion records. This supermassive breach contains data from numerous previous breaches, including major platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Adobe, Canva, Badoo, Weibo, Tencent, MySpace, Telegram, Dropbox, Daily Motion etc. making it potentially the largest-ever discovered data leak.

Among the record leaks, Tencent had approximately 1.5 billion leaks alone followed by Weibo which had 504 million leaks and MySpace 360 million leaks. Twitter had around 281 million records leaked, LinkedIn also had 251 million leaks. The leak also has records of various government organisations from the USA, Brazil, Turkey, Germany, Philippines and other countries.

The MOAB is not merely a compilation of previously stolen data; it likely contains new and previously unpublished information. The dataset containing 26 billion records is spread across 3,800 folders, corresponds to separate data breaches, raising concerns about the potential misuse of aggregated data for identity theft, phishing, targeted cyberattacks, and unauthorised access to personal accounts. Given that users often reuse usernames and passwords, the potential for exploitation is immense.

While the dataset encompasses over 26 billion records, the actual number of unique records is expected to be lower due to duplicates. The leaked data includes sensitive information beyond credentials, making it highly valuable for malicious actors. 

The MOAB surpasses previous large-scale compilations, such as the 2021 (Compilation of Many Breaches) COMB that contained 3.2 billion records, constituting only 12% of the supermassive MOAB discovered in 2024.