RockYou2021: 8.4 billion passwords leaked online
What seems to be the largest password collection of all time, dubbed RockYou 2021, has been leaked on a popular hacker forum, according to Cybernews.
A forum user posted a massive 100GB TXT file that contains 8.4 billion entries of passwords.
According to the post author, all passwords included in the leak are 6-20 characters long, with non-ASCII characters and white spaces removed. The same user also claims that the compilation contains 82 billion passwords. However, after running its own tests, Cybernews found the actual number was nearly ten times lower – at 8,459,060,239 entries.
The compilation itself has been dubbed ‘RockYou2021’ by the forum user, presumably in reference to the infamous RockYou data breach that occurred in 2009, when threat actors hacked their way into the social app website’s servers and got their hands on more than 32 million user passwords stored in plain text.
An example of leaked passwords included in the RockYou2021 compilation:
With a collection that exceeds its 12-year-old namesake by more than 262 times, this leak is comparable to the Compilation of Many Breaches (COMB), the largest data breach compilation ever. Its 3.2 billion leaked passwords, along with passwords from multiple other leaked databases, are included in the RockYou2021 compilation that has been amassed by the person behind the compilation over several years.
Considering the fact that only about 4.7 billion people are online, the RockYou2021 compilation potentially includes the passwords of the entire global online population almost two times over. For that reason, users are recommended to immediately check if their passwords were included in the leak.
You can head over to the CyberNews personal data leak checker or its leaked password checker now, where it is currently uploading the password entries from the RockYou2021 compilation.
Potential impact
By combining 8.4 billion password variations with other breach compilations that include usernames and email addresses, threat actors can use the RockYou2021 collection to mount password dictionary and password spraying attacks against untold numbers of online accounts.
Since most people reuse their passwords across multiple apps and websites, the number of accounts affected by credential stuffing and password spraying attacks in the wake of this leak can potentially reach millions, if not billions.
What to do if your password was leaked?
If you suspect that one or more of your passwords may have been included in the RockIt2021 collection, Cybernews recommends taking the following steps in order to secure your data and avoid potential harm from threat actors:
- Use its personal data leak checker and leaked password checker to see if your data has been leaked in this or other breaches.
- If your data has been compromised, make sure to change your passwords across your online accounts. You can easily generate complex passwords with our strong password generator or consider using a password manager.
- Enable two-factor authentication (2FA) on all of your online accounts.
- Watch out for incoming spam emails, unsolicited texts, and phishing messages. Don’t click on anything that seems suspicious, including emails and texts from senders you don’t recognize.
The full report can be found here: https://cybernews.com/
