When talking about cybersecurity, people usually think about fancy hacking techniques, security flaw hunting, smart CVE exploiting, firewall bypassing, system infiltrating and many many cinematic scenarios, mostly inspired by many movies.
In reality, majority of hacking happened in a way that were not awesome like that. Set Phishing tactics aside, where at least, hackers abuses psychology weaknesses to trick victims to download malware or reveal their OTP codes, there is another reason that can suprise you when you see it.
Here we list some data breaches with its reasons that can be confirmed via news, mostly occurred in 2023 with similar patterns. You can read through this table and see how system can be hacked in a surprising way. Before reading through, here is some keywords and its meaning in this context:
- Ransomware: a malware that encrypts all files in compromised computer and asks for ransom to decrypt. This malware does not automatically jump into a computer, it usually is downloaded and run by victims themself after getting tricked by a phishing emails or a fake website.
- Misconfiguration: is when a developer unintentionally exposes doors for anyone can access the system.
- Social Engineering: something like: guessing passwords based on personality and level of security awareness, impersonate IT supports, relatives, friends or family members to collect private information, etc
- Unknown: Victims did not disclose information at the time publishing this post, but it happened in the same period of time, so I doubt these also go with similar reasons.
| Company | Domain | Breached Data | Money | Reason |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| iRent | car rental | – millions of partial credit card numbers – at least 100,000 customer identification documents | N/A | the database has no password |
| Yes Madam | Salon platform | – customers’ location data – user device details, – IMEI numbers of ~900,000 users | N/A | the database has no password |
| PeopleGrove | social platform for higher education institutions and alumni networks | – gigabytes of personal information: email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, details of university achievements and scores, and resumes containing detailed work histories and employment details | N/A | the database has no password |
| Proskauer Rose | international law | – private and privileged financial and legal documents, contracts, non-disclosure agreements, financial deals and files relating to high-profile acquisitions. | N/A | misconfiguration |
| AvidXchange | automate invoice processing and payment management processes | – employee payroll information – corporate bank account numbers. | N/A | easily guessable passwords |
| Toyota | Manufacture | – data of 2 millions customers | N/A | misconfiguration |
| Ferrari | Supercar Manufacturer | – 7GB of documents, data sheets and repair manuals. | N/A | Ransomware |
| LogicMonitor | network security | – data of a small number customers | N/A | use of default password |
| Microsoft | AI | – accidentally exposed tens of terabytes of sensitive data, including private keys and passwords | N/A | publishing a storage bucket of open source training data on GitHub. |
| Tesla | – 75,000 company employees personal information | N/A | two former employees leaked | |
| Microsoft | – a key that allowed to stealthily break into dozens of email inboxes, including those belonging to several federal government agencies. | N/A | Unknown | |
| Crema Finance | Crypto | $9 million in cryptocurrency | ethical hacker turning rogue | |
| Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing | ChipMaker | $70 million ransom demand | Leaked setup information | |
| Social Network | – 80+ gigabytes of compressed data | N/A | “highly-targeted” phishing attack | |
| T-Mobile | Telecom | – personal data belonging to 37+ million customers. | N/A | social engineering + SIM swap |
| MailChimp | – 400+ accounts mostly of cryptocurrency and finance-related accounts | N/A | social engineering | |
| Okta | Identity | – 134 organizations data | N/A | stolen credentials |
| Truepill | Pharmacy Fulfillment | – 2.3+ million patients personal data | N/A | poor security design |
| NextGen Healthcare | electronic health record software | – 1.05 million patients personal data | N/A | Ransomware |
| Maternal & Family Health Services | Healthcare | – 461,070 personal data of patients, employees and vendors | N/A | Ransomware |
| 23AndMe | Genetic testing | – 6.9 million user data records | N/A | Unknown |
| McLaren Health Care | Healthcare | – 2.2 million patients sensitive personal and health information | N/A | Ransomware |
| HCA Healthcare | Healthcare | – 11 million patients’ data | N/A | Unknown |
| Sabre | Travel booking | – 1.3 terabytes of data on ticket sales, passenger turnover, employees’ personal data, corporate financial information. | N/A | Ransomware |
| MGM Resorts | Hotel & Casino | – unspecified amount of customers’ personal information – ATM shut down – Website offline | ~ $100 million | Ransomware |
| Caesars Entertainment | Hotel & Casino | N/A | $30 million demanded | Ransomware |
| Motel One | Hotel | – 50 credit cards data | N/A | Ransomware |
| Radisson | Hotel | N/A | N/A | Ransomware |
| Euler Finance | Finance | N/A | ~ $197 million in crypto theft – 1.3M USD gone | “in a flurry of transactions” |
| Mixin | Crypto | N/A | ~ $200 million stolen | Unknown |
| Mom’s Meals | Food | – 1.2+ million individuals data | N/A | Ransomware |
| NationBenefits | supplementary benefits | – 7,100+ residents personal data | N/A | Ransomware |
| Yum Brands | fast-food chains | ~ 300 UK restaurants data | N/A | Unknown |
| Forever 21 | Clothing | 500.000+ individuals data | N/A | Ransomware |
| Byju | edtech | N/A | N/A | misconfiguration |
| JumpCloud | Access management | a “small and specific” set of customers. | N/A | Unknown |
| Dish | satellite television | – 300,000 personal information | N/A | Unknown |
| SchoolDude | order management system | – 3M SchoolDude user accounts | N/A | Unknown |
| Shadow | Game | – 530,000 customers data | N/A | social engineering |
| Boeing | Aerospace | N/A | N/A | Ransomware |
| National Aerospace Laboratories | Aerospace | – eight purportedly stolen documents ( confidential letters, an employee’s passport internal documents) | N/A | Ransomware |
| Zhefengle | e-commerce | – millions of Chinese citizen identity numbers from 3.3 million orders | N/A | Unknown |
| A network of knockoff apparel stores | Store | – 330,000 credit card numbers, cardholder names, and full billing addresses | N/A | Unknown |
| ODIN Intelligence | Applications for polices | Leaked files reveal tactical plans for police raids, surveillance and facial recognition | N/A | Unknown |
| LastPass | Password manager | customers’ encrypted password vaults | N/A | Unknown |
| British Library | Library | – website offline ~490,000 user data | N/A | Ransomware |