A Leak of 500 million WhatsApp Phone Numbers

There may have been a significant data leak that affected WhatsApp. According to a recent study, there are currently 500 million WhatsApp phone numbers available for purchase. This data comes from 84 nations, including India. For more details, see the material below.

A threat actor posted on a hacker website that they were selling the data of 487 million WhatsApp users, according to a CyberNews story. More than 11 million users from the UK, more than 32 million users from the US, 45 million users from Egypt, 29 million users from Saudi Arabia, and 35 million users from Italy were represented in the database. The data of millions of people in Russia, India, and other countries was also exposed.

According to reports, the cybercriminal was charging $7000 (about Rs 5,71,000) in the US, $2,500 (roughly Rs 2,04,000) in the UK, and $2000 (roughly Rs 1,63,000) in Germany to sell the data.

The WhatsApp numbers and other information may be exploited by malicious parties for phishing attacks, frauds, and other internet crimes if they are released.

The report notes that the threat actor was contacted to determine whether the material was authentic, and it turned out that it was. The dataset contained actual WhatsApp phone numbers from the UK and the US, 1,097 and 817, respectively. However, it is unknown how the data was obtained.

Meta (formerly Facebook), which has seen its fair number of data breaches in the past, was contacted by CyberNews. Facebook data from more than 500 million users was exposed in 2021 on a hacking forum, including more than 6 million people in India. At this time, there has been no commentary on the subject. Additionally, it is impossible to identify the users who have been impacted.

You can verify if your data has ever been compromised on CyberNews by going to this page and entering your phone number or email. The best course of action is to reset your passwords and apply additional security measures, such as 2FA, if your account has been compromised. Since there has been a significant data leak, it is best to be secure. You may do this by avoiding dubious websites and WhatsApp conversations. In the event that you encounter any, merely report them.

Source

NDTV : Data Of 500 Million WhatsApp Users Leaked, Up For Sale Online: Report

Cyber News : WhatsApp data leaked – 500 million user records for sale online

91mobiles : WhatsApp data leak: phone numbers of 500 million users up for sale, should you worry? [Update]