In a worrying turn of events, the Facebook Marketplace database has been compromised, and hackers claim to possess personal information of at least 200,000 users. This incident was reported by a hacker associated with Breach Forums, an illicit dark web marketplace.
According to the statements, partial user data was allegedly obtained in October 2023 by a cybercriminal identified as "algoatson", who managed to breach a contractor in charge of managing cloud services for Facebook. This individual, using the pseudonym "algoatson", would have extracted a partial database containing detailed information on at least 200,000 users.
The compromised information, shared by a threat actor known as "IntelBroker", includes full names, hashed passwords, links to profile photos, Facebook IDs, emails, phone numbers, languages, and other attributes such as average rating, number ratings and comments, as well as profile settings. The hacker maintains that even users' physical IDs were among the compromised data.
This serious incident, which came to light on February 11, has been confirmed by Hacread.com, which identified 24,127 email addresses along with other confirmed data.
This is not the first time Facebook has faced data breach issues.
Recall that in 2022, a database with records of 533 million Facebook users was made public on the Internet for free. The company has been criticized for allowing third parties to collect user data, with the Cambridge Analytica scandal being one of the most notable.
The imminent risk with the exposure of this personal information lies in the possible long-term consequences for those affected.
Cybercriminals often take advantage of this data to:
Phishing attacks
Send malicious emails
Execute other types of persuasive attacks against those whose information has been exposed
If you use this shopping platform, we recommend using strong passwords, activating multi-factor authentication on important accounts, monitoring against phishing and spear phishing attempts, checking for possible duplicate passwords, and immediately setting up security measures. . additional for accounts that share similar passwords.
Caution and prudence online are crucial in times like these to protect the personal information and digital integrity of each user.