The worlds biggest data breach affecting 1 billion Chinese citizens

The worlds biggest data breach affecting 1 billion Chinese citizens is unfolding around a Shanghai police database.

Reuters reports that an anonymous hacker, identified only as “ChinaDan”, offered to sell more than 23 terabytes of data in a post on a hacker forum. 

“Databases contain information on 1 billion Chinese national residents and several billion case records, including: name, address, birthplace, national ID number, mobile number, all crime/case details.” 

However Reuters stated they were unable to verify the authenticity of the post.

China has in recent years seen a number of data leak incidents. In 2016, sensitive informationabout powerful Chinese individuals, including the founder of Alibaba, Jack Ma, was posted on Twitter.

These incidents alarmed the Chinese authorities. Last year, China passed laws governing how personal information and data generated within its borders should be handled.

- CyberBeat