When it comes to commodities, data is now one of the most valuable commodities there is. Back in 2006, British Mathematician Clive Humby even went as far as to argue that “data is the new oil.” Yet in the hands of cybercriminals, there’s one piece of data that’s digital gold: your password.
Passwords, alongside other user data like names and email addresses, are an extremely valuable commodity for hackers, who regularly buy and sell this information on the dark web as part of an underground economy. Malicious entities then purchase this data knowing that it gives them the key to stealing an individual’s digital identity.
In fact, ForgeRock released its fourth annual breach report today, the 2022 ForgeRock Consumer Identity Breach Report, which revealed that over 2 billion data records containing usernames and passwords were compromised in 2021, an increase of 35% from 2020.
Other records compromised included the victim’s name, address, Social Security number (SSN), date of birth, protected health information (PHI), and payment or banking details.
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