Cybersecurity experts have revealed that a misconfigured cloud database has led to the exposure of usernames, passwords, and other sensitive information for approximately 149 million users of Facebook, Instagram, and Gmail.
The database was discovered by cybersecurity researcher Jeremiah Fowler, who reported that it contained 96 gigabytes of unsecured data. The leaked information included not only social media and email accounts but also details from various other online services.
Affected accounts included 48 million Gmail accounts, 17 million Facebook accounts, 6.5 million Instagram accounts, 3.4 million Netflix accounts, 780,000 TikTok accounts, 420,000 Binance accounts, and 100,000 OnlyFans accounts. Millions of Yahoo, Outlook, iCloud, and educational email accounts were also impacted.
Experts explained that the data had been collected via a virus that infiltrates infected mobile devices or computers, stealing passwords, browser-stored data, and other sensitive information before transmitting it to hackers.
Cybersecurity professionals warned that such data leaks increase the risk of account misuse, financial fraud, and phishing attacks, especially if users reuse passwords across multiple accounts.
Importantly, this breach did not occur due to a hack of a single company’s system; rather, it resulted from information compiled from multiple sources.
