Every year, cyber attacks grow more sophisticated, leaving behind a staggering trail of financial loss and compromised data. In 2024, global cybercrime costs are expected to hit a staggering $9.5 trillion, making it clear that no one is immune to the risks.
In this article, we compiled a list of the most significant and famous data breaches that occurred in the past decade. Based on open-source information, we listed the causes, scope, costs, and potential preventative steps for each incident.
By understanding these cases, you’re better equipped to prevent your business from becoming the next headline.
List of Data Breaches: World’s Biggest Cyber Attacks To Date
Be it government institutions, the financial services industry, retail, and restaurants, or airlines, no industry is immune to cyber security breaches.
Here are the most notable cyber attacks that have happened in the last two decades.
Notable Cyber Attacks Targeted at Government, Cities & Universities
- Atlanta, GA – 2018
On March 22, 2018, the city of Atlanta, Georgia was struck by a ransomware attack known as SamSam. Like other cryptoworms, the attack prevented municipal workers from accessing their systems — the hackers demanded $51,000 in Bitcoin payments for restoring access.
The attack hampered the city’s court and utility services as well as its ability to receive bill payments. Some of these systems did not come back online until April.
The city was criticized for maintaining a “woefully disorganized and outdated” IT system.
Type: SamSam ransomware.
Date: March 22, 2018
Cost: Estimated recovery costs at $2.7 million.
Impact: Essential city systems were taken offline, some (such as managing traffic-ticket System hearings) did not come back online until mid-April.
What Could Have Been Done
Atlanta could have replaced obsolete and non-secure software and established processes — including training, strong password protection, etc — to prevent and respond to cyber-attacks.
- Republican National Committee – 2017
In 2017 the personal information — including names and addresses — of 198 million American voters was exposed. Anyone could look up the Republican National Committee’s (RNC) information without the need for a password or other security measures.
The cause of the cyber breach vulnerability originated from misconfigured servers owned by Deep Root Analysis, an outside contractor providing analytics services to the RNC.
Type: Data breach
Date: June 2017
Cost: Unknown
Impact: 198 million personal address records at risk.
What Could Have Been Done
Deep Root Analysis should have taken all necessary steps to keep its cloud servers secure. Failure to do so could have violated various federal and state regulations.
- Aadhaar – 2018
In January 2018, Aadhaar, which is both India’s and the world’s largest government database (containing information about more than 1 billion-plus people) was exposed.
The exposure was exploited by a group that was charging money in return for the information of any person registered in Aadhaar. People could also buy print-outs of the Aadhar cards, a unique identification card people could use to access fuel subsidies and other benefits.
The exposure came as a result of multiple cyber threats (including weaknesses in Aadhaar’s main application), social engineering attempts involving fake Aadhaar portals, and mistakes on the part of Aadhaar staff.
Type: Data exposure, insider threats, and exploits against weak applications.
Date: January 2018
Cost: Unknown
Impact: The personal information of 1 billion-plus Indian citizens was exposed.
What Could Have Been Done
A system of this scale requires a prompt and fully-defined response mechanism to deal with potential data exposure and other potential cyber security breaches.
In addition, as social engineering was one of the methods used to instigate the breach, Aadhaar staff should have been trained to recognize and stop such attempts.
- Cyber Attacks on US & Global Institutions – 2013-2018
On March 23, 2018, the US Department of Justice indicted nine Iranians for a spate of security breaches against US government institutions and major private entities, such as universities and research institutes, since at least 2014.
According to the Justice Department, the attackers struck:
“144 U.S. universities, 176 universities across 21 foreign countries, 47 domestic and foreign private sector companies, the U.S. Department of Labor, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the State of Hawaii, the State of Indiana, the United Nations, and the United Nations Children’s Fund.”
Type: Primarily spear-phishing
Date: 2013-2018
Cost: The hackers stole 31 terabytes of information, including intellectual property (IP) worth $3 billion dollars (Wired).
Impact: Loss of billions of dollars worth of research IP and confidential private sector data (including those of law firms, investment firms, and a healthcare company).
What Could Have Been Done
With false emails being the major data breach method, the affected institutions should have invested in training all staff to identify and report spear-phishing emails.
In addition, these institutes could have also invested in geofencing to prevent out-of-country logins, analytics tools to alert cyber security staff of irregular behavior by potentially affected accounts, and multi-factor authentication.
Biggest Data Breaches in the Finance Industry
- Anthem Inc. – 2014-2015
In 2015, Anthem Inc. became the victim of one of the biggest hacks in the financial services industry in recent years. The major data breach affected a database containing the personal information — including social security numbers — of nearly 80 million people.
Type: An undisclosed type of cyber attack (CSO Online).
Date: December 10, 2014, to January 27, 2015.
Cost: Anthem settled to a $115 million class-action lawsuit (USA Today).
Impact: With 37.5 million records stolen, the attack put millions of Anthem’s clients at risk of identity theft and having their private data sold on the black market.
What Could Have Been Done
Few public details are available, but given that the attack had occurred for over a year, it was clear that Anthem lacked a prompt threat identification, reporting, and response mechanism.
In addition, Anthem did not encrypt client data, which, while not a regulatory requirement under HIPAA at the time, was considered a best practice. Meanwhile, Healthcare breaches remain the costliest, with the average health data breach in 2024 costing $9.77 million.
- Equifax – 2017
Of more recent data breaches, Equifax is among the biggest in scope considering the attack compromised 143 million accounts in the US.
The attack exposed the names, birth dates, driver’s licenses, and social security numbers of millions of people. It also affected people residing in the UK and Canada.
By combining the cost of recovery, class action lawsuits, and regulatory penalties, this attack is on pace to become the costliest electronic breach thus far.
Type: An undisclosed cyber attack results from a security flaw in Apache Struts (CNN).
Date: July 29, 2017.
Cost: $439 million by the end of 2018, potentially $600 million-plus (Reuters).
Impact: 143 million people are at risk of identity theft and other fraudulent activity.
What Could Have Been Done
Equifax said it had closed the vulnerability, but it still happened. Thorough stress testing by a certified ethical hacker could have put Equifax’s fixes to the test and potentially uncovered the gap so that the company could fix it properly.
Notable Data Breaches that Affected Airlines & Hotels
- Marriott – 2018
In November 2018, Marriott disclosed that the data of up to 383 million guests were exposed.
However, the seriousness of the breach varies. For example, most of the affected databases were still encrypted (Vox), despite potentially being in the hands of the attackers.
Though it had revealed the cybersecurity breach was a result of an attack, it did not state how the attack occurred or the gaps the attacker exploited (Bloomberg).
Type: An undisclosed type of cyber attack.
Date: November 30, 2018.
Cost: Marriott could potentially spend $200 million in fines and legal costs (Bloomberg).
Impact: Of the 383 million exposed accounts, Marriott reported that 5.25 million of them were unencrypted passport numbers, 20.3 encrypted passport numbers, and 8.6 encrypted credit and debit card numbers exposed (Vox).
What Could Have Been Done
Marriott did not disclose the cause of the attack, but it appears that incomplete recovery work for past cyber breaches may have had a hand. An aggressive cyber security audit of those past efforts may have helped identify gaps sooner.
- British Airways – 2018
This was a more recent cyber security breach. In October 2018, British Airways announced that as many as 380,000 credit cards, and possibly more, may have been compromised due to credit card skimming malware found in its system in August 2018 (TechCrunch).
Type: Malware code injection into British Airways’ global website and application.
Date: July or August 2018
Cost: Not disclosed.
Impact: 380,000 accounts at direct risk of theft and other fraudulent activity.
What Could Have Been Done
Critics have suggested that British Airways’ parent company, IAG, did not invest enough in modern cybersecurity technologies and was too focused on cutting costs (Financial Times).
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Most Significant Cyber Attacks on Technology Companies
- Facebook – 2018
With 50 million Facebook users potentially affected, the breach was a result of a vulnerability in Facebook’s code, specifically its “View As” function (Wired).
Type: Exploits aimed at gaps or weaknesses in Facebook’s code.
Date: 16 September 2018
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: Undisclosed, potentially 50 million users.
What Could Have Been Done
Facebook has a vast and complex system, so keeping tabs on potential exploits requires a significant investment in monitoring, stress testing, issue reporting, and issue response capabilities.
- T-Mobile – 2018
In August 2018, T-Mobile announced that it shut down a data breach affecting customer data.
The breach reportedly affected 2.3 million T-Mobile customers (Vice), but T-Mobile stated that no financial or social security information was exposed. Rather, only account numbers, email addresses, and phone numbers were at risk (USA Today).
Type: Undisclosed.
Date: August 20, 2018.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 2.3 million customers were affected.
Did you know that T-mobile kept experiencing significant data breaches even till 2023?
T-Mobile’s repeated data breaches highlight the vulnerabilities telecom companies face. One of the attacks in 2023 compromised the data of 37 million T-mobile customers, even after the company pledged to enhance its defenses. It’s clear: prevention and rapid response are critical.
What Could Have Been Done
T-Mobile did not disclose how long the attackers had access to its customer data, but in this case, prevention and a rapid response mechanism were essential requirements.
- Sony (PlayStation Network) – 2011
In 2011, Sony’s PlayStation Network (PSN) suffered a major breach that resulted in the theft of personal information of up to 77 million gamers.
Sony said that its gamers’ “names, addresses, email address (sic), birth dates, usernames, passwords, logins, and security questions” were compromised (Reuters).
The Sony data breach also resulted in a network outage of PSN’s online gaming for 23 days.
Type: Undisclosed type of hack plus a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
Date: April 20, 2011 to May 14, 2011.
Cost: $171 million in recovery costs (PC Magazine).
Impact: 77 million user accounts were affected.
What Could Have Been Done
One of the most famous data breaches up until that point, the attack was well-planned and well-executed. The technology to make prevention easier is available today, but at that time, quicker response timing and a fully defined recovery strategy were critical.
- Uber – 2016
In November 2017, the CEO of Uber, Dara Khosrowshahi, disclosed that the company suffered a data breach in late 2016.
The breach exposed the names and license plate numbers of 600,000 drivers in the United States as well as the names, phone numbers, and email addresses of 57 million Uber users worldwide. Uber maintains that no financial or social security information was affected.
Type: Undisclosed type of hack on an outside cloud service.
Date: Uber says in “late 2016.”
Cost: $148 million in regulatory fines (CNBC) plus undisclosed recovery costs.
Impact: 57 million user accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
In its incident response efforts, Uber paid $100,000 to the hacker in exchange for not disclosing the issue. This is against cybersecurity best practices (and dubious).
Also, Uber should have reported the breach to regulators and affected persons sooner.
- RSA Security – 2011
In 2011, the multi-factor authentication (MFA) company RSA disclosed that it was struck by two successful spear-phishing attacks.
These attacks carried a zero-day exploit of Adobe Flash and compromised RSA’s SecureID tokens. At this point, Lockheed Martin was using SecureID and had reported at the time that it was at the receiving end of a hacking attempt. This was one of many major security breaches of direct concern to the US Government.
Type: Spear-phishing (The Register)
Date: Disclosed in March and April 2011.
Cost: $66 million (The Register)
Impact: The attack compromised a trusted security vendor and potentially compromised its clients, including marquee firms such as Lockheed Martin. This was a national security issue.
What Could Have Been Done
Training all employees to recognize and properly escalate phishing/spear-phishing attempts.
- Timehop – 2018
On July 04, 2018 Timehopdisclosed that it identified an unauthorized user initiated an attack on the company’s database, affecting 4.7 million users (TechCrunch). The company said that it is now taking steps, such as hiring a security consultant, to prevent future breaches.
Type: The attacker compromised an authorized admin’s logins to gain access.
Date: The attacker began probing in December 2017 and started the attack in July 2018.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 4.7 million user accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
Besides training to prevent users from sharing login details, security tools such as multi-factor authentication (MFA), geofencing admin logins, and monitoring admin accounts for suspicious behavior could have helped prevent the attack from occurring by spotting the probing earlier.
- Yahoo – 2013 – 2014
In September 2016, Yahoo announced that it had a data breach (at that point the biggest in the history of major data breaches) affecting 3 billion user accounts.
Type: Undisclosed type of cyber attack.
Date: 2013 to 2014.
Cost: Undisclosed, but it forced Yahoo to discount its purchase price to Verizon (which was in the process of buying Yahoo) by $350 million.
Impact: According to Yahoo, the attack exposed the names, email addresses, birth dates, and phone numbers of each of those 3 billion users (CSO Online).
What Could Have Been Done
Since neither Yahoo nor Verizon (the new owner of Yahoo’s internet business) disclosed the exact cause of the attack, it is unclear what steps could have been taken.
However, Yahoo should have notified regulators as soon as those breaches occurred, not 2 to 3 years after the fact.
- Under Armour – 2018
On February 2018 Under Armour announced that 150 million of its MyFitnessPal users were affected by a cybersecurity breach.
Under Armour confirmed that the breach did not affect its users’ social security numbers and driving license numbers as it does not request that information.
Type: Undisclosed.
Date: February 2018
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 150 million user accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
Given that Under Armour has not disclosed specifics about the attack, it is difficult to define best practices in its specific case. However, it has been criticized for not reporting the issue to regulators and affected users soon enough.
Significant Data Breaches in the Food, Shopping & Retail Industry
- eBay
In 2014, eBay disclosed that a cyber security breach compromised the names, birth dates, addresses, and encrypted passwords of each of its 145 million users. The attackers had full access to the user database for 229 days.
Type: Undisclosed, but experts believe the eBay data breach to have been a result of a spear-phishing attack.
Date: 2014
Cost: Undisclosed, but eBay lowered its annual sales target for that year by $200 million.
Impact: 145 million user accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
With the attacker active for over half a year, it’s evident that eBay had required a better threat detection and incident response mechanism. It also should have reported the issue earlier.
- Panera Bread – 2018
In April 2018, Panera Bread disclosed that it was affected by — and subsequently resolved — a cyber breach affecting “thousands” of customer records.
However, the company was made aware of the breach 8 months prior to its official statement (The Verge). Experts also found that Panera Bread’s website leak had included millions of customer records. The actual fix itself took less than two hours (CSO Online).
Type: Panera Bread’s website was using an unauthenticated API endpoint.
Date: The vulnerability was there since August 2017.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 37 million customer records at risk (CSO Online).
What Could Have Been Done
Panera Bread should have had a process to investigate the initial report about its website.
Besides that, Panera Bread could have also instituted regular audits of its cyber security system so that such leaks are internally identified earlier.
- Heartland – 2008
In March 2008 Heartland was struck by one of the largest cyber security breaches up until that point. However, the company did not learn of the breach until January 2009 when Visa and MasterCard notified it of dubious activities from accounts that it processed (Comodo).
Type: The attacker installed spyware on Heartland’s systems using an SQL injection.
Date: March 2008
Cost: $148 million as compensation for those affected by fraudulent activities.
Impact: Undisclosed.
What Could Have Been Done
It should have better monitored its data systems to detect suspicious activities, such as the SQL injection, and audited its systems (via system scans) to identify the spyware.
- Target Stores – 2013
In late 2013, 70 million customer credit and debit card accounts were thought to have been compromised as a result of a major electronic breach at Target (Forbes).
Type: Undisclosed, but the attackers exploited a gap in one of Target’s vendors.
Date: November 27 to December 18, 2013.
Cost: $162 million as of 2015 (TechCrunch)
Impact: 70 million customer accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
The information the attackers needed to plan for the attack was freely available on the web (ZDNet). Target should have guarded this information and should have also held its outside vendors more accountable for their cyber security practices.
- Sonic Drive-In – 2017
In 2017 Sonic Drive-In disclosed that it found a data breach affecting 325 of its locations. The company warned that “credit and debit card numbers may have been acquired without authorization as part of a malware attack experienced in certain Sonic Drive-In locations.”
Type: Undisclosed type of malware attack.
Date: Announced in September 2017
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: Up to 5 million customer credit cards may have been compromised, causing Sonic’s customers to closely monitor their purchases and request replacement cards.
What Could Have Been Done
Experts believe the issue was largely out of Sonic’s hands, considering the attacker’s methods exploited gaps in the technology itself, not Sonic specifically.
For example, the United States is the last G20 member to adopt chip-based card technology, which is much more secure than stripe, but only 44% of stores in the US were accepting it for payments as of March 2017.
Significant Cyber Attacks in the Health Industry
- Catawba Valley – 2018
In 2018, HealthEquitysuffered from 2 data breaches, one in June and the other in October.
The first attack compromised the accounts of 16,000 customers, while the second breached the accounts of 190,000 customers.
Though the hackers breached the system by accessing employee email accounts, they were able to bypass HealthEquity’s multi-factor authentication (MFA) system by exploiting an email configuration error.
Type: Undisclosed.
Date: Undisclosed.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: Undisclosed.
What Could Have Been Done
The spear-phishing attacks could have been thwarted if Catawba Valley employees were trained on recognizing and stopping such attacks.
- HealthEquity – 2018
In 2018, HealthEquitysuffered from 2 data breaches, one in June and the other in October.
The first attack compromised the accounts of 16,000 customers, while the second breached the accounts of 190,000 customers.
Though the hackers breached the system by accessing employee email accounts, they were able to bypass HealthEquity’s multi-factor authentication (MFA) system by exploiting an email configuration error.
Type: A combination of spear-phishing and exploiting an email configuration error.
Date: June and October 2018.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 206,000 patient accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
HealthEquity could have trained its employees to recognize and stop phishing attempts as well as auditing its systems to ensure endpoints, such as email, are properly configured.
- MedEvolve & Premier – 2018
In July 2018, MedEvolve, a healthcare software provider, disclosed that it suffered from a data breach that compromised 200,000 patients at Premier Immediate Medical Care (renamed to Tower Urgent Health Care).
The breach was pinpointed to an unsecured file on an FTP server in which Premier’s patient data was freely available. Of those records, 11,000 contain social security numbers.
MedEvolve removed the file when a researcher at Premier notified us about the issue.
Type: Data exposure due to a server misconfiguration.
Date: March 29 to May 4, 2019. MedEvolve discovered the issue on May 11, 2019.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 200,000 patient accounts affected.
What Could Have Been Done
First, MedEvolve should have ensured that its servers were properly secured and that its clients’ data was not exposed.
Second, Premier should have required MedEvolve to prove that all of its data was secure, this may have prompted MedEvolve to conduct an audit and discover the vulnerability earlier.
- Augusta University Health – 2016-2017
In August 2018, Augusta University Health disclosed that it suffered from a potential data breach in July and August 2017. The breach affected 417,000 individuals and put their personal and health data at risk of exposure.
The hospital announced that it will remedy the issue by:
- Installing new leaders to manage “critical areas”;
- Implement multi-factor authentication for off-campus email access;
- Employ new software to scan emails for confidential health and private information;
- Train staff;
- Enhance compliance efforts.
Type: Spear-phishing.
Date: July-August 2017.
Cost: Undisclosed.
Impact: 417,000 patient accounts were affected.
What Could Have Been Done
Based on Augusta University Health’s planned remediation steps, the hospital appears to have required a thorough review of its cyber security practices, from training to systems.
List of Recent Data Breaches Between 2022 and 2024
Here’s a table showing the most recent notable cyber security breaches that has happened between 2022 and 2024:
Date | Organization | Details | Impacted Individuals/Systems |
November 5, 2024 | Planned Parenthood of Montana | Cyberattack exposed 93 GB of data | 18,000 individuals |
November 4, 2024 | Thompson Coburn & Presbyterian Healthcare | Data breach, lawsuit ensues | 300,000 people |
November 1, 2024 | Kaiser Permanente | Illegal access to email servers | 40,000 members |
October 28, 2024 | Mystic Valley Elder Services | Breach compromised personal information | 90,000 individuals |
October 18, 2024 | RRCA Accounts Management, Inc. | June cyberattack accessed customer data | 115,837 people |
October 18, 2024 | Summit Pathology | Malicious actor accessed health data | 1,813,538 patients |
October 14, 2024 | OnePoint Patient Care | Ransomware breach disclosed | 800,000 individuals |
October 10, 2024 | Game Freak | Data leak included employee and source code data | 2,606 employees & partners |
October 6, 2024 | Cisco | Hacker group accessed significant data | Unknown amount of data |
September 12, 2024 | Fortinet | Customer data breached via Azure site | “Small number” of 775,000+ customers |
September 11, 2024 | Access Sports Medicine | Data of 88,000 patients stolen | 88,000 patients |
September 6, 2024 | Slim CD | Credit card data leak affected 1.7 million | 1.7 million individuals |
August 24, 2024 | Port of Seattle | Ransomware attack by Rhysida | Ongoing threat |
August 16, 2024 | National Public Data | 2.9 billion records leaked on the dark web | 2.9 billion individuals |
August 12, 2024 | Jerico Pictures/National Public Data | Alleged breach, class action filed | Nearly 3 billion people |
July 26, 2024 | FBCS | Revised breach numbers from earlier report | 4.2 million individuals |
July 15, 2024 | Disney | Slack messages from 1.2 TB of data exposed | Unknown impact |
July 14, 2024 | AT&T | Paid $370,000 in Bitcoin to hacker | Nearly all customers |
June 13, 2024 | Truist Bank | Breach exposed employee data, on sale for $1 million | Unknown number of employees |
June 11, 2024 | Tile | Extortion attempt, user data accessed | Unknown scope |
June 1, 2024 | Ticketmaster | Customer data breach affecting 560 million | 560 million customers |
May 13, 2024 | Helsinki City Council | Hack targeted education systems | Unknown number of students & guardians |
May 10, 2024 | JPMorgan Chase | Software flaw exposed info for 500,000 | 500,000 individuals |
May 9, 2024 | Dell | Attack on customer portal; data for 49 million customers affected | 49 million customers |
May 1, 2024 | Dropbox | Threat actor accessed data through Dropbox Sign | Unknown number of users |
April 17, 2024 | US Government | Serbian hacker breached Space-eyes | Highly confidential government data |
April 14, 2024 | Giant Tiger | Records for nearly 3 million customers stolen | 3 million individuals |
April 12, 2024 | Roku | Data breach affected 576,000 customers | 576,000 individuals |
March 20, 2024 | Vans | Identity theft risk after unauthorized access | Unknown number of customers |
March 18, 2024 | Fujitsu | Malware discovered, data compromised | Unknown impact |
February 13, 2024 | Bank of America | Ransomware attack affected 57,000 | 57,000 customers |
January 27, 2024 | Anthropic | Data leak involving non-sensitive info | Affected customers notified |
January 23, 2024 | Trello | 15 million user data leaked on dark web | 15 million users |
January 2, 2024 | Victoria Court System | Court hearings hacked, limited access | Unknown number affected |
December 11, 2023 | Norton Healthcare | Data breach impacted 2.5 million patients and employees | 2.5 million individuals |
November 24, 2023 | Vanderbilt Medical Center | Ransomware attack by Meow group | 40,000 employees, data status unclear |
November 15, 2023 | Toronto Public Library | Ransomware attack exposed data from 1998 | Unknown number affected |
November 5, 2023 | Infosys | US unit applications impacted by attack | Impact under investigation |
November 2, 2023 | Boeing | Ransomware group LockBit claimed attack | Business data impacted |
October 30, 2023 | Indian Medical Council | 815 million Covid test records exposed | 815 million citizens |
October 19, 2023 | Okta | Support system accessed using stolen credentials | Unknown number affected |
October 11, 2023 | Air Europa | Credit card data stolen | Unknown number of customers |
October 6, 2023 | 23andMe | Genetic data targeted in credential-stuffing attack | Unknown number of accounts |
September 27, 2023 | Hunter Biden | Lawsuit over data access and sharing | Personal data exposed |
September 25, 2023 | SONY | Ransomware group stole and threatened to sell data | 6,000 files accessed |
September 5, 2023 | Topgolf Callaway | Customer data breach affected 1 million | 1 million customers |
August 31, 2023 | Forever 21 | Data breach affected 500,000 customers | 500,000 customers |
August 23, 2023 | Duolingo | Data of 2.6 million users leaked | 2.6 million individuals |
August 14, 2023 | Discord.io | Data breach, sensitive user info accessed | 760,000 users |
July 27, 2023 | Maximus | MOVEit hack compromised health data for 11 million | 8-11 million individuals |
July 20, 2023 | PokerStars | Data breach exploiting MOVEit vulnerability | 110,000 customers |
June 27, 2023 | American Airlines | Hackers accessed data of thousands of pilots | 8,000 pilots |
June 19, 2023 | BlackCat group demands ransom, 80GB data | Confidential Reddit data | |
May 23, 2023 | Apria Healthcare | Data from breaches in 2019 & 2021 revealed | 1.9 million customers |
April 10, 2023 | Yum! Brands | Ransomware attack on fast food chains | Names, ID details accessed |
March 24, 2023 | ChatGPT | OpenAI library bug exposed user data | Credit card and chat info |
February 15, 2023 | Atlassian | SiegedSec group accessed office data | Employee and office info |
January 30, 2023 | JD Sports | Breach impacted 10 million people | 10 million individuals |
January 19, 2023 | T-Mobile | Breach affected 37 million customers | 37 million customers |
December 31, 2022 | Slack | Employee tokens used to access GitHub | Code repositories |
December 15, 2022 | SevenRooms | 400GB data posted on hacking forum | Sensitive client data |
December 1, 2022 | LastPass | Repeated data breach reported | Customer details secure |
November 11, 2022 | AirAsia | Ransomware attack, personal data stolen | 5 million passengers and staff |
October 26, 2022 | Medibank | Unauthorized access affected 4 million | 4 million customers |
September 23, 2022 | Optus | Major breach affected 9.7 million users | Sensitive customer data |
August 29, 2022 | Nelnet Servicing | Student loan data for 2.5 million exposed | 2.5 million people |
August 4, 2022 | Twilio | Employee login credentials compromised | 125 customers |
July 19, 2022 | Neopets | Data breach affected 69 million users | 69 million users |
July 12, 2022 | Deakin University | Cyberattack exposed 46,980 students’ data | 46,980 students |
June 7, 2022 | Shields Health Care Group | Healthcare data breach affected 2 million | 2 million patients |
May 26, 2022 | Verizon | Social engineering attack exposed employee data | Employee database |
April 4, 2022 | Cash App | Breach impacted 8.2 million users | 8.2 million customers |
March 26, 2022 | US Dept. of Education | 820,000 students’ data accessed | 820,000 students |
February 25, 2022 | Nvidia | Hacking group breached chipmaker’s network | 71,000 employees |
January 6, 2022 | Flexbooker | Breach revealed data of 3.7 million | 3.7 million accounts |
Data Breaches vs. Data Leaks vs. Cyberattacks
Data breaches occur when a malicious actor infiltrates an organization’s system to intentionally steal sensitive, private, or personally identifiable information.
These breaches can lead to devastating outcomes, such as companies being forced to pay ransom or having their data exposed on the dark web. Alarmingly, an estimated 5.9 billion accounts were affected by data breaches in just 2021 alone.
In 2023, the Identity Theft Research Center (ITRC) reported a record high number of data compromises in the U.S. The number of breaches was 72% higher than the previous all-time high in 2021.
Data breaches are a subset of cyberattacks, but not every cyberattack results in a data breach.
Cyberattacks can have various objectives, including disrupting services or slowing down websites. Some cyberattacks do exfiltrate data, but others may solely aim to cause operational chaos.
On the other hand, a data leak happens when sensitive information is accidentally exposed to the public without malicious intent. For example, the Texas Department of Insurance incident involved data being inadvertently accessible.
Data leaks often result from errors like a government employee mistakenly emailing confidential information. Unlike breaches, leaks generally involve data becoming vulnerable or accessible through non-malicious means.
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How Can I Protect My Business from Cyberattacks?
Taking proactive measures to shield your organization from cyberattacks is more critical than ever.
The financial fallout from breaches can be catastrophic, and it’s not just businesses that are vulnerable. Schools and colleges are frequently targeted, facing significant financial and operational repercussions.
In some cases, such as Lincoln College, the consequences were so severe that they led to permanent closure.
A primary way attackers gain unauthorized access is through weak or compromised account credentials. To combat this, implement a password manager for your entire team. This ensures strong, unique passwords are used for every account, significantly reducing the risk of credential theft.
Complement your password manager with Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) to create an additional barrier to unauthorized access.
Employee training is another essential line of defense. Over 75% of cyberattacks target business email accounts, making awareness crucial.
Equip your staff with the knowledge to recognize suspicious emails and phishing attempts. Human vigilance is just as vital as any technical solution, and investing in regular security awareness training can be a game-changer for your organization’s cyber resilience.
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