Over 16 billion login details including passwords of users with Google and Apple accounts have been leaked. This is one of the biggest data leaks in tech history, which security experts claim could put any of us at major risk of getting hacked or bank accounts being cleaned up. 

Google and Apple IDs are important and used all across the internet, including your social accounts. Imagine the scale of this password leak that can give hackers and bad actors the ability and power to pick and choose their targets based on the volume and credential of their profile. 

Password Leak Concerns: What Reports Say

The details about this scary breach have been shared in a report by Forbes, which talks about a database that has over 184 million records that are lying unprotected on a web server. Researchers have actually found over 30 datasets that can have over 3.5 billion records. 

The worry is that the data is likely to include VPN logins for corporate and developer platforms. Experts have pointed out that the dataset can become a powerful weapon in the wrong hands, and this much intelligence at a scale can be used to unleash a mega digital war that most people will find it hard to escape. 

Having details like email ID and other personal information makes it easy for the hackers to exploit the victims via phishing attacks that can allow them to completely take over a person’s digital profile on the internet. 

When you consider the amount of digital history that people have created in the last decade, datasets like these once again show the perils of using basic security measures. Google and other tech giants have been harping and advising their people to start using two-factor authentication for their accounts, not limited to the traditional OTPs that you get on the registered mobile number. 

Time To Upgrade

Passkeys are another alternative and something that most brands are now advocating for as it will be tough to break a digital account without having the ID for the account holder. 

Google, Apple, Microsoft and recently Meta have talked about making the upgrade, and most people are seeing their accounts get a message asking them to start using biometric security for their App store purchases and other digital footprint in general.