Budapest Post

Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate
Budapest, Europe and world news

0:00
0:00

Hacker claims to have obtained data on 1 billion Chinese citizens

Personal information allegedly taken from Shanghai police database would be one of biggest data breaches in history.
A hacker has claimed to have stolen the personal information of 1 billion Chinese citizens from a Shanghai police database, in what would amount to one of the biggest data breaches in history if found to be true.

The anonymous hacker, identified only as “ChinaDan”, posted on hacker forum Breach Forums last week offering to sell the more than 23 terabytes (TB) of data for 10 bitcoin, equivalent to about $200,000 (£165,000).

“In 2022, the Shanghai National Police (SHGA) database was leaked. This database contains many TB of data and information on billions of Chinese citizen,” the post said.

“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.”

The identity of the hacker is not clear.

Officials in China have yet to respond to the alleged data hack as of Monday.

Yi Fu-Xian, a senior scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said he had downloaded the sample data available on the internet and found information related to his home county in Hunan province.

“The data contained information about almost all the counties in China, and I have even discovered data related to a remote county in Tibet, where there are only a few thousand residents,” he said, adding that the demographic trend extracted from the data “is worse than the officials have reported”.

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.

Over the weekend, ChinaDan’s post has been widely discussed on China’s Weibo and WeChat social media platforms over the weekend, with many users worried it could be real.

The hashtag “Shanghai data leak” was blocked on Weibo by Sunday afternoon, but there are still a few discussions on Chinese social media about this incident. Users expressed shock and dismay, with some saying they were now “transparent human beings”.

Kendra Schaefer, head of tech policy research at Beijing-based consultancy Trivium China, said in a post on Twitter it was “hard to parse truth from rumour mill”.

If the material the hacker claimed to have came from the ministry of public security, it would be bad for “a number of reasons”, Schaefer said. “Most obviously it would be among biggest and worst breaches in history.”

Zhao Changpeng, CEO of Binance, said on Monday the cryptocurrency exchange had stepped up user-verification processes after the exchange’s threat intelligence detected the sale of records belonging to one billion residents of an Asian country on the dark web.

He wrote on Twitter that a leak could have happened due to “a bug in an elastic search deployment by a (government) agency”, without saying if he was referring to the Shanghai police case.

The claim of a hack comes as China has vowed to improve protection of online user data privacy, instructing its tech giants to ensure safer storage after public complaints about mismanagement and misuse.
AI Disclaimer: An advanced artificial intelligence (AI) system generated the content of this page on its own. This innovative technology conducts extensive research from a variety of reliable sources, performs rigorous fact-checking and verification, cleans up and balances biased or manipulated content, and presents a minimal factual summary that is just enough yet essential for you to function as an informed and educated citizen. Please keep in mind, however, that this system is an evolving technology, and as a result, the article may contain accidental inaccuracies or errors. We urge you to help us improve our site by reporting any inaccuracies you find using the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of this page. Your helpful feedback helps us improve our system and deliver more precise content. When you find an article of interest here, please look for the full and extensive coverage of this topic in traditional news sources, as they are written by professional journalists that we try to support, not replace. We appreciate your understanding and assistance.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Ukraine Declares De Facto War on Hungary and Slovakia with Terror Drone Strikes on Their Gas Lifeline
A monster hit and a billion-dollar toy empire
Animated K-pop Musical ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ Becomes Netflix’s Most-Watched Original Animated Film
Canada: Nurse Suspended and Fined 93 Thousand Dollars After Stating the World’s Most Well-Known Fact Since the Creation of Adam and Eve, That There Are Only Two Genders
Elon Musk tweeted, “Europe is dying”
Far-Right Activist Convicted of Incitement Changes Gender and Demands: "Send Me to a Women’s Prison" | The Storm in Germany
Hungary Criticizes Ukraine: "Violating Our Sovereignty"
Will this be the first country to return to negative interest rates?
U.S. Treasury Secretary Whitney Bessent Backs Stablecoins to Boost Treasury Demand
Spain to Declare Disaster Zones After Massive Wildfires
Three-Minute Battery Swap Touted as Future of EVs
Beijing Military Parade to Showcase Weapons Advances
U.S. Tech Stocks Slide on AI Boom Concerns
White House Confirms Talks Over Intel Stake
Trump Suggests U.S. Could Support Ukraine ‘By Air’
Trump Called Viktor Orbán: "Why Are You Using the Veto"
Horror in the Skies: Plane Engine Exploded, Passengers Sent Farewell Messages
AI in Policing: Draft One Helps Speed Up Reports but Raises Legal and Ethical Concerns
Shame in Norway: Crown Princess’s Son Accused of Four Rapes
Apple Begins Simultaneous iPhone 17 Production in India and China
A Robot to Give Birth: The Chinese Announcement That Shakes the World
Finnish MP Dies by Suicide in Parliament Building
Outrage in the Tennis World After Jannik Sinner’s Withdrawal Storm
Class Action Lawsuit Against Volkswagen: Steering Wheel Switches Cause Accidents
UK Government Tries to Sue 4chan for Breaching Online Safety Act
Dogfights in the Skies: Airbus on Track to Overtake Boeing and Claim Aviation Supremacy
Tim Cook Promises an AI Revolution at Apple: "One of the Most Significant Technologies of Our Generation"
Are AI Data Centres the Infrastructure of the Future or the Next Crisis?
Miles Worth Billions: How Airlines Generate Huge Profits
Cambridge Dictionary Adds 'Skibidi,' 'Delulu,' and 'Tradwife' Amid Surge of Online Slang
Zelenskyy Returns to White House Flanked by European Allies as Trump Pressures Land-Swap Deal with Putin
The CEO Who Replaced 80% of Employees for the AI Revolution: "I Would Do It Again"
"Every Centimeter of Your Body Is a Masterpiece": The Shocking Meta Document Revealed
Character.ai Bets on Future of AI Companionship
China Ramps Up Tax Crackdown on Overseas Investments
Japanese Office Furniture Maker Expands into Bomb Shelter Market
Intel Shares Surge on Possible U.S. Government Investment
Hurricane Erin Threatens U.S. East Coast with Dangerous Surf
EU Blocks Trade Statement Over Digital Rule Dispute
EU Sends Record Aid as Spain Battles Wildfires
Beijing is moving into gold and other assets, diversifying away from the dollar
China Requires Data Centres to Source Majority of AI Chips Locally, For Technological Sovereignty
Escalating Clashes in Serbia as Anti-Government Protests Spread Nationwide
Category 5 Hurricane in the Caribbean: 'Catastrophic Storm' with Winds of 255 km/h
Trump Backs Putin’s Land-for-Peace Proposal Amid Kyiv’s Rejection
Digital Humans Move Beyond Sci-Fi: From Virtual DJs to AI Customer Agents
YouTube will start using AI to guess your age. If it’s wrong, you’ll have to prove it
Jellyfish Swarm Triggers Shutdown at Gravelines Nuclear Power Station in Northern France
OpenAI’s ‘PhD-Level’ ChatGPT 5 Stumbles, Struggles to Even Label a Map
Zelenskyy to Visit Washington after Trump–Putin Summit Yields No Agreement
×