Hackers claim theft of police info in China’s largest data leak

The person or group claiming the attack has offered to sell more than 23 terabytes of stolen data from the database, including names, addresses, birthplaces, national IDs, phone numbers and criminal case information, according to an anonymous post on an online cybercrime forum last week. — Dreamstime/TNS

Unknown hackers claimed to have stolen data on as many as a billion Chinese residents after breaching a Shanghai police database, in what industry experts are calling the largest cybersecurity breach in the country’s history.

The person or group claiming the attack has offered to sell more than 23 terabytes of stolen data from the database, including names, addresses, birthplaces, national IDs, phone numbers and criminal case information, according to an anonymous post on an online cybercrime forum last week. The unidentified hacker was asking for 10 bitcoin, worth around US$200,000 (RM882,600).