Hackers stole the email addresses of more than 200 million Twitter users and posted them on an online hacking forum, a security researcher said Wednesday.
\nAccording to international medi reports, the breach \u201cwill, unfortunately, lead to a lot of hacking, targeted phishing and doxxing,\u201d Alon Gal, co-founder of Israeli cybersecurity-monitoring firm Hudson Rock, wrote on LinkedIn. He called it \u201cone of the most significant leaks I’ve seen.\u201d
\nTwitter has not commented on the report, which Gal first posted about on social media on Dec. 24, nor responded to inquiries about the breach since that date. It was not clear what action, if any, Twitter has taken to investigate or remediate the issue.
\nSources could not independently verify the data on the forum was authentic and came from Twitter. Screenshots of the hacker forum, where the data appeared on Wednesday, have circulated online.
\nTroy Hunt, creator of breach-notification site Have I Been Pwned, viewed the leaked data and said on Twitter that it seemed \u201cpretty much what it\u2019s been described as.\u201d
\nThere were no clues to the identity or location of the hacker or hackers behind the breach. It may have taken place as early as 2021, which was before Elon Musk took over ownership of the company last year.
\nClaims about the size and scope of the breach initially varied with early accounts in December saying 400 million email addresses and phone numbers were stolen.
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