Has China Just Seen the Largest Data Hacking Heist in History?

It’s not exactly a secret that China likes to keep a pretty firm eye on its citizens. While this may, of course, come under the somewhat friendly guise of data keeping and general national security, it’s hard to overlook the fact that a lot of this is also done to ensure that they can keep a close watch on certain individuals and especially those who may engage, or be suspected of, anti-government activities. – It seems though that this methodology of tracking and data recording may have just resulted in one of the biggest hacking incidents the world has ever seen!

Following a report via MSN, a yet unknown individual or hacking group has successfully obtained over 23TB of data which is understood to include masses of personal information for over a billion (yes, that’s a million with a B) Chinese citizens!

China Police Hack Leaks ONE BILLION Peoples Personal Data!

Based on the report, it’s understood that the Shanghai police department was recently subject to a major data breach which has seen the personal information of over a billion Chinese residents stolen by person/s yet unknown. – This includes:

• Names
• Full addresses
• Birth places
• National ID numbers
• Phone numbers
• Information appertaining to any criminal investigations (past or present)

So, in other words, China has just possibly seen highly-sensitive data for over two-thirds of its entire population stolen. And if that wasn’t bad enough, apparently, it’s already available to purchase online right now!

Highly Personal Data For Sale!

Various unconfirmed reports have said that this stolen data is currently being offered on the dark web with an asking price of 20 Bitcoin (circa $400,000 based on current prices). While the Chinese government has yet to comment on the matter one way or the other, however, the evidence and information presented here do seem to overwhelmingly support that this is a genuine hacking incident, and one by proxy, that might represent the single largest cyber attack the world has ever seen!

In regard to its authenticity though, I would look for it myself just to 100% confirm this, but I’m not going to lie, places like the ‘Dark Web’ tend to make me a little uncomfortable that my own government might not start watching me sooner or later. I’m pretty sure my name is already on some list somewhere in China regarding the news I have covered on them in the past.

If nothing else though, this does seem to make the case that having centralised information on citizens is probably not an overly good idea. Well, not if you seem to have metaphorical rubber bands and paperclips holding your online security together!

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!