Popular Articles
Today Week Month Year


Hackers steal over a million Social Security numbers and other sensitive personal information from National Public Data
By Laura Harris // Aug 21, 2024

Background check service National Public Data (NPD) has confirmed that hackers breached its systems and leaked Social Security numbers and other sensitive personal information of over a million people.

Earlier in August, Christopher Hoffman filed a lawsuit against Jerico Pictures Inc., the company that operates the NPD service, on behalf of the others affected. In the lawsuit, Hoffman accused the company of leaving about 2.9 billion records of sensitive personal data unencrypted and vulnerable to unauthorized access.

According to the complaint, a cybercrime organization known as "USDoD" allegedly infiltrated NPD’s systems in late December 2023.

The hackers reportedly began leaking data in April 2024, with further leaks occurring throughout the summer. The compromised data includes Social Security numbers, mailing addresses, email addresses, phone numbers and other personally identifiable information for the last three decades. (Related: PayPal hack exposes names, social security numbers of 35,000 customers.)

The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida, also alleges that many of the affected were not customers of NPD. Their information was allegedly "scraped" by third parties and shared with the company without their consent. The database was then put on sale on the dark web for $3.5 million.

In line with this, the NPD published several statements admitting to the data breach.

In a notice published by the Office of the Maine Attorney General on Aug. 17, the NPD disclosed that 1.3 million people, including over 2,000 residents of Maine, were affected by the breach. Before that, the NPD also released an undated statement on its website to acknowledge the breach and advise consumers to mitigate potential harm associated with the unauthorized use of Social Security numbers. Additionally, the NPD sent letters on Aug. 10 to notify affected consumers of the breach and advise them to take steps to protect their financial information.

NPD recommended that individuals contact the three major U.S. credit reporting agencies – Equifax, TransUnion and Experian – to obtain a free credit report and consider placing a fraud alert on their credit files.

Some cybersecurity experts try to downplay the hacking

Troy Hunt, the founder of the "Have I Been Pwned" (HIBP) service, tried to downplay the hacking. Hunt stated that one version of the leaked database contained 134 million unique email addresses. He also revealed discrepancies within the data, including incorrect associations between names and dates of birth, as well as outdated addresses.

These findings mirror his own experience, as he discovered one of his email addresses is associated with two different birthdates, neither of which is correct.

Similarly, Bleeping Computer, a cybersecurity news platform, discovered that access to the official statement of the NPD regarding the breach has been blocked for IP addresses in various U.S. regions and even outside the country. Tests conducted by BleepingComputer found that some individuals were linked to incorrect names, and in some cases, outdated addresses were listed. Meaning, not all of the information in the leak appears to be accurate.

But many of the victims also confirmed the accuracy of the records included in the compromised data. The data even includes information about deceased individuals.

Visit CyberWar.news for more stories of data breaches and other hacking incidents.

Watch this video discussing the massive data breach of Social Security numbers.

This video is from the AllTheWorldsAStage channel on Brighteon.com.

More related stories:

Social security expected to run out of money by 2033, a year earlier than previous predictions.

Social Security reserves draining faster than expected.

Sen. Marco Rubio: Government provides more welfare to new migrants than to Social Security recipients.

Health Ranger warns: Inflation will WIPE OUT pensions, Social Security.

White House deletes tweet boasting about bigger Social Security payouts as netizens point out the increase is tied to decades-high inflation.

Sources include:

TheEpochTimes.com

NYPost.com

BleepingComputer.com

Brighteon.com



Take Action:
Support NewsTarget by linking to this article from your website.
Permalink to this article:
Copy
Embed article link:
Copy
Reprinting this article:
Non-commercial use is permitted with credit to NewsTarget.com (including a clickable link).
Please contact us for more information.
Free Email Alerts
Get independent news alerts on natural cures, food lab tests, cannabis medicine, science, robotics, drones, privacy and more.

NewsTarget.com © 2022 All Rights Reserved. All content posted on this site is commentary or opinion and is protected under Free Speech. NewsTarget.com is not responsible for content written by contributing authors. The information on this site is provided for educational and entertainment purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional advice of any kind. NewsTarget.com assumes no responsibility for the use or misuse of this material. Your use of this website indicates your agreement to these terms and those published on this site. All trademarks, registered trademarks and servicemarks mentioned on this site are the property of their respective owners.

This site uses cookies
News Target uses cookies to improve your experience on our site. By using this site, you agree to our privacy policy.
Learn More
Close
Get 100% real, uncensored news delivered straight to your inbox
You can unsubscribe at any time. Your email privacy is completely protected.