CALL US (UK) 0121 651 1577 / (USA) 917 284 9515

Cyber Security – The biggest breaches in 2018

Cyber Security – The biggest breaches in 2018
10th October 2018 Amy

Cyber Security – The biggest breaches 2018 (so far)

Cyber Security is always prevalent within the media and a number of well-recognised brands have been targeted this year by cybercriminals.

Here’s our run-down of seven of the most noteworthy for 2018 (so far).

 

MyFitnessPal (February 2018) – 150 million users

In March 2018, the owners of MyFitnessPal; Under Armour; announced that in February there had been a data breach that caused the loss of usernames, email addresses and passwords of 150 million users. The passwords were encrypted and the company came clean as soon as they became aware of the breach.

 

Facebook (2014/2015) – 100+ million users

Using personal information obtained without authorisation, Cambridge Analytica built a system in 2014 that could profile individual US voters and using data harvested from Facebook; target them with personalised political propaganda. 100 million users were affected by the issue and Facebook’s reputation was severely damaged as a result.

 

MyHeritage (February – June 2018) – 92 million users

Between February and June 2018, the DNA testing firm suffered a breach that exposed 92 million emails and some password information. The data had been stored on a private server and once obtained, it was sent to third-party security researchers.

 

Timehop (July 2018) – 21 million users

Timehop, a platform that connects to numerous social networks and shows users their previously popular posts, was exposed to an ongoing cyberattack in July which compromised names, email addresses and “keys” that allowed access to previous posts.

 

Ticketmaster (February – June 2018) – 40,000 users

Reported to Ticketmaster by Monzo (the digital bank), the exposure of personal data included login information, payment data, addresses, name and telephone numbers of 40,000 people.

 

OnePlus (November 2017 – January 2018) – 40,000 users

Between November 2017 and January 2018, the website of the Chinese smartphone manufacturer was compromised as a result of a malicious script being injected into the payment page coding. The script was responsible for collecting customer’s payment data and sharing it with the hackers. As a result, credit card numbers, expiry dates and security codes may have been exposed said OnePlus.

 

Strava (January 2018) – Military Personnel

The popular running app ran into hot water in January 2018 after their huge public map of workouts revealed the locations of military personel. Due to their location in a rural setting, the heatmap data showed people around military bases and also revealed names and heart rates of individuals in highly-restricted bases.

 

Is there one we have missed? Let us know at [email protected]!