ZeroHour

Search: “Chaos”

55 stories

Leaks, data breaches, and ransom notes: The worst hacks of 2026 so far

TechCrunch's 2026 roundup covers SSA data exposure, Iranian water-utility attacks, Klue breach hitting ~200 firms, and Meta AI chatbot account hijacks.

TechCrunch's mid-year roundup highlights a whistleblower claim that DOGE uploaded a live Social Security database copy to an unsecured third-party server, which House Democrats called potentially the largest US breach in history. CISA reported Iranian hackers targeted over 100 US water providers over the summer, while Russian-linked attacks hit Polish, Swedish, and Norwegian energy and water infrastructure. Market research firm Klue was breached via a stale 2022 pilot credential, exposing cloud keys of ~200 customers including Jamf, HackerOne, and LastPass to extortion gang Icarus. Separately, tens of thousands of Instagram accounts were hijacked by abusing Meta's AI chatbot to trigger password resets to attacker-controlled emails.

TechCrunch · Security · 1d agoData breach in the wild

Florida says motor vehicle data breach tied to credentials stolen from officer’s personal device

ShinyHunters breached Florida's DMV using credentials stolen from a police officer's personal device; the state confirmed the breach and is investigating.

Florida's Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV) confirmed a data breach after ShinyHunters obtained DMV data using credentials a criminal actor took from a Plant City police officer's personal electronic device. The department learned of the breach on September 4, is investigating with the Florida Digital Service, and ShinyHunters shared a DMV record of Jeffrey Epstein as proof of access. Experts initially speculated a link to the IDScan breach of 153 million driver's licenses. Anthropic reported that suspected ShinyHunters affiliates use AI to scan credentials, map systems, and exfiltrate data, in one case moving from a stolen developer token to cloud admin access in about three hours.

The Recordupdated · 16h agofirst · 5d agoData breach in the wild 3 sources

Troy Hunt

Troy Hunt warns ShinyHunters' Carhartt breach claim of 50GB and millions of records is unverified, while Sri Lanka joins Have I Been Pwned.

Troy Hunt's blog roundup centers on a cautionary tale about data breach claims: ShinyHunters claims it compromised Carhartt and stole over 50GB of compressed data containing millions of customer records, employee information and loyalty data, but Hunt stresses criminal claims require verification. The feed also covers Sri Lanka CERT becoming the 48th government onboarded to Have I Been Pwned's free government monitoring service, following Nepal as the 47th. Other commentary addresses ransomware economics, Brinks Home's lawyer-heavy extortion FAQ, and the Origin Energy breach in Australia.

Troy Hunt · 10d agoData breach1