Hackers stole the e-mail addresses of greater than 200 million Twitter customers and posted them on a web-based hacking discussion board, a safety researcher stated Wednesday.

The breach “will unfortunately lead to a lot of hacking, targeted phishing and doxxing,” Alon Gal, co-founder of Israeli cybersecurity-monitoring agency Hudson Rock, wrote on LinkedIn. He known as it “one of the most significant leaks I’ve seen.”

Twitter has not commented on the report, which Gal first posted about on social media on December 24, nor responded to inquiries in regards to the breach since that date. It was not clear what motion, if any, Twitter has taken to analyze or remediate the difficulty.

Reuters couldn’t independently confirm the information on the discussion board was genuine and got here from Twitter. Screenshots of the hacker discussion board, the place the information appeared on Wednesday, have circulated on-line.

Troy Hunt, creator of breach-notification web site Have I Been Pwned, considered the leaked knowledge and stated on Twitter that it appeared “pretty much what it’s been described as.”

There have been no clues to the identification or location of the hacker or hackers behind the breach. It could have taken place as early as 2021, which was earlier than Elon Musk took over possession of the corporate final yr.

Claims in regards to the dimension and scope of the breach initially assorted with early accounts in December saying 400 million e mail addresses and telephone numbers have been stolen.

A serious breach at Twitter could curiosity regulators on each side of the Atlantic. The Data Protection Commission in Ireland, the place Twitter has its European headquarters, and the US Federal Trade Commission have been monitoring the Elon Musk-owned firm for compliance with European knowledge safety guidelines and a US consent order respectively.

Messages left with the 2 regulators weren’t instantly returned on Thursday.

© Thomson Reuters 2023