MediaWorks data breach: 162K accounts exposed
Severity: medium · Patch status: no-fix-needed · Since 2024-03-22
In March 2024, millions of rows of data from the New Zealand media company MediaWorks was publicly posted to a popular hacking forum. The incident exposed 163k unique email addresses provided by visitors who filled out online competitions and included names, physical addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth, genders and the responses to questions in the competition. Some victims of the breach subsequently received ransom demands requesting payment to have their data deleted. Exposed data: dates of birth, email addresses, genders, phone numbers, physical addresses. The breach dates from Mar 15, 2023; Have I Been Pwned loaded it on Mar 22, 2024.
What to do
- If you had a MediaWorks account, change its password and the password of any other account that reused it.
- Turn on multi-factor authentication wherever it is offered.
- Check whether your addresses are in this breach at https://haveibeenpwned.com.
- Expect targeted phishing that quotes the leaked details; verify any unexpected contact out of band.
Sources
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