Could 16 bn passwords be the world's largest data breach?

The details reportedly belonged to users who had accounts on Apple, Facebook, Google

- Shouvik Das

On June 19, a report by cybercrime and data breach reporting platform Cybernews said that a collection of 30 live databases was found with information stolen from individuals around the world—collecting what was claimed as 16 billion passwords and their corresponding credentials. The details reportedly belonged to users who had accounts on the most popular online services—Apple, Facebook, Google and others. Has the breach in question really put most users of the internet at risk? Perhaps not—Mint explains why.

What really happened in the alleged data breach? Cybersecurity researchers that Mint spoke with said that the breaches in question were not strictly new or a single consolidated breach, as early reports had claimed. Instead, the new databases are more like master databases where breached information gathered over almost the past decade was put together by an unidentified group or entity.