Here are the Top 5 Data Breaches of 2024. Take Steps to Protect Your Accounts and Identity.

If you cannot name five of the top data breaches of 2024, that’s not a good sign. Why? Because your name and personal information about you may have been stolen by hackers when they attacked and breached the networks. Worse than that, your information is likely public by now. And put on the dark web by the criminals who stole it for other hackers to buy or use for free.

If a phone carrier gets hacked (as one did this year), you might not worry if you don’t have an account with that carrier right now. But you’re not necessarily safe. You may have applied for an account years ago, and your information is still on file. So, even if you’ve not heard of a company that experienced a data breach, you could still be affected by it. The top 5 data breaches of 2024 prove that.

  These were the top five data breaches of the year:*

1. The National Public Data Breach (NPD)
2. Ticketmaster
3. Infosys McCamish Systems (IMS)
4. Financial Business and Consumer Solutions
5. ATt&T

1. The National Public Data Breach (NPD)

Size of the breach: Up to 2.9 billion records.

Even though the name sounds official and government-like, NPD is a public company that looked into every corner of the internet and “scraped” data from legitimate but non-public sources. The data went back thirty years. It included Social Security numbers (which caused the most concern), information about family, siblings, home addresses, and more. It was also collected without the consent of the billions of people affected by the data breach. Supposedly, the stolen records contained information on Americans, Canadians, and British citizens. The hacker/criminals put the stolen data for sale on the dark web for $3.5 million.

It seems that NPD wasn’t forthcoming about the breach of their network and the stolen data. Only after a class-action complaint was filed in Florida in the Summer (months after the breach) did the whole story come to light, and NPD acknowledged it publicly.

2. Ticketmaster (Live Nation Entertainment)

Size of the breach: Estimated at 500 million people.

It’s shocking to think that an organization with the names and numbers of credit card users could let a data breach happen…but it happened. The violation or “unauthorized activity,” Live Nation Entertainment called it, occurred from early April to mid-May. A well-known hacking outfit called ShinyHunters took credit for the data breach, announcing they’d information of about 560 million people. You can imagine their haul—names, home addresses, email addresses, order details, and payment information. And yes, ShinyHunters put the stolen information on sales on the dark web in late May.

3. Infosys McCamish Systems (IMS). A high-tech service provider.

Size of the breach: Six million potential victims.

As we wrote early on, many companies that are victims of a data breach are ones you don’t

do business with directly and probably never heard of…but hacking groups know all about them and the data they have.  That’s the case with IMS, a “tech vendor” that delivers services and solutions to major insurance companies, banks, and investment companies like Bank of America, Fidelity Investments Life Insurance, Newport Group, and more.  Of course, IMS had ongoing access to information about those corporate clients’ customers and clients. In late 2023, IMS determined that “unauthorized activity” occurred and that their data was subject to unauthorized access and acquisition.”

The hackers gained access to a treasure trove of data. IMS revealed that the breached data included medical records, payment card information, passport information, checking account and credit card numbers, and even some biometric data! In early 2024, Bank of America and Fidelity notified their customers about a breach caused by “an unidentified third party.” Eight months after they acknowledged the breach, IMS took until June to reach out to six million potential victims.

4. FBCS: A debt-collection company

Scope of the breach: 4.25 million affected consumers.   

Here’s another excellent example proving your data can slip into the wrong hands because of someone else’s misfortune, negligence, or bad luck. Financial Business and Consumer Solutions serves businesses by collecting consumer debt in various industries, from credit cards and auto loans to utilities and healthcare providers. In February they reported that an “unauthorized actor” had viewed or acquired certain information on their networks during “a period of access. In other words, “we had a data breach.” Because FBCS exists in the credit realm as a debt collector for large organizations, they possess details about consumer accounts on two levels. 1) Consumer information that was stolen included Social Security numbers, birth dates, driver’s license numbers, and state ID numbers, for example; 2) medical data stolen encompassed medications, treatments, medical conditions and diagnoses, and insurance information! That’s quite a score for the cyber thieves.

It’s bad enough that a debt collection agency might call you to resolve a bill you forgot to pay or was unresolved. When that same agency slips up and doesn’t protect your data well enough (for their clients and you), that’s more bad news.

5. AT&T: Losing customer trust after a different kind of breach.

In April of this year, AT&T, a major mobile carrier, discovered that hackers had stolen millions of records. It wasn’t credit card numbers or driver’s license numbers—it turned out the call and text logs of nearly all its customers. And not just AT&T customers but also their affiliated network users: Boost Mobile, Consumer Cellular, and Cricket. AT&T told everyone that customers’ personal data was not part of the data stolen but did little to quell the storm of criticism, worry, or lawsuits.

Why the outrage? For one, there is concern that dedicated cybercrooks can use the wealth of text- and phone-log data for phishing attempts, impersonator scams, and other consumer fraud. Using today’s tech tools, fraudsters could develop various ways to deceive consumers. It was also the size of the breach. Nearly 100 million customers were affected. But more than that, everyone seems to be fed up with big companies, such as AT&T, not protecting the data (your data) they’re entrusted with. This data breach pushed a lot of consumers and critics to the “that’s enough!” frustration point.

The top data breaches hit large companies but affect millions of ordinary people.

As this 2024 recap of the most significant data breaches of 2024 reveals, our online safety isn’t only in our hands. Businesses and organizations you know and have an account or relationship with and those you’ve never heard of can suffer a data breach and put your personal information and privacy at risk.

What to do if your name and account were included in a data breach.

1. Take any news of data breaches seriously and do some research whenever you hear about one.  
2. Don’t count on a business to report a data breach right away. As this article revealed, other sources will often inform you of a data breach before the hacked company will.
3. Change your password immediately for any account with a company that announces a data breach. Sometimes, hackers steal usernames and passwords in a breach, which gives them easier access to consumer accounts.
4. You can perform a free data breach check at any time on WhatIsMyIPaddress.com. Enter your most frequently used email address(es) and see the results.  

Do a data breach check now without leaving our website. It’s simple, safe and free.

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