New Delhi: A huge database of 272 million hacked usernames and passwords for email accounts and other websites, which include Gmail, Microsoft, Yahoo and more, are being traded in Russia's criminal underworld for less than $1 (Rs 66 approx).
According to a report by Reuters, when security analysts at Hold Security reached out to the hacker and began negotiating for the dataset to verify the authenticity of those records, the hacker asked just 50 roubles — less than $1 in return of the complete dump.
But the good news here is a large number of those 1.17 billion accounts credentials turned out to be duplicate and only 272 million records were unique, confirmed Alex Holden, founder and chief information security officer of Hold Security.
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According to the report, Yahoo Mail credentials numbered 40 million, or 15 per cent of the 272 million unique IDs discovered. Meanwhile, 33 million, or 12 per cent, were Microsoft Hotmail accounts and 9 per cent, or nearly 24 million were Gmail accounts and 57 million belong to Russia’s leading email provider Mail.ru.
A Mail.ru spokesperson told Reuters, “The initial checks by Mail.ru found no active combinations of user names and passwords that match their existing email accounts.”
Last week, PwnedList, a website with the largest database of stolen credentials said their emails account, has been hit by hackers.
