WhatsApp, an instant messaging and voice-over-IP service that is deemed a safe platform owing to its end-to-end encryption feature, is said to have experienced a data breach that compromised nearly 500 million users.
According to a recent claim from Cybernews, someone managed to hack WhatsApp and collect the personal information of around 500 million users, which is now allegedly for sale, according to Mashable India, a digital media platform. An actor allegedly advertised the sale of over 487 million WhatsApp users’ personal information, including mobile phone numbers, on a hacker website.
According to the listing, the user data includes 32 million US users as well as users from 84 other countries, including Egypt, Italy, Saudi Arabia, France, and Turkey.
Phone numbers stolen can be used for impersonation, phishing, and other fraudulent activities. Meta, Whatsapp’s parent company, has yet to respond to this development.
According to Mashable India, the WhatsApp user database from the United States is being sold for USD 7,000, which is significantly higher than the rates for user data from the United Kingdom and Germany, which are USD 2,500 and USD 2,000, respectively. It’s said that no user profiles from India are on the list.
According to Mashable India, the hacked shared a small amount of data that included user information for 1097 US phone numbers and 817 UK phone numbers when cybernews requested a sample from them.
