Biggest Cyber Security Breaches of 2017

2017 was another record year for the number of cyber attacks and breaches, with hackers becoming ever more sophisticated. Here are some of the biggest breaches which we witnessed. 





Wonga: 
A British payday lender; Wonga was hacked in April of 2017. Customer’s personal details were stolen such as telephone, address, and bank account details. The hack could affect up to 270,000 users and result in millions of pounds in fraud costs for their customers. 
Equifax:
Up to 143 million people in the US, UK and Canada could have been affected by a hack in February on consumer credit rating company Equifax. The hack was done by exploiting software vulnerabilities and resulted in millions of peoples social security numbers and other private information being stolen, which could be used by criminals to take our credit cards and loans fraudulently.  
Cloudbleed:   
Cloudflare is one of the largest content delivery networks and DDOS mitigation services. In February a Google security researcher found a bug which was leaking very sensitive user information such as login details, and even security keys. The bug could potentially have aided hackers in gaining access to user accounts of Cloudflare’s customers including big names as OKCupid, Fitbit, and Uber.    
Freedom Hosting Pop: 
On a semi positive note the hacker group Anonymous pulled down a very large portion of the “dark web” by hacking the web hosting service Freedom Hosting. A large number of the sites operating on the onion network were sites sharing child pornography.   
Wannacry: 
By far the most controversial and widely publicized cybersecurity attack of 2017. The Wannacry ransomware attack affected computers by encrypting data and demanding bitcoin payment for removing the data encryption. Organisations worldwide were infected by the attack, the most well-known being the British National Health Service. The attack is thought to have originated from North Korea, however the US National Security Agency was already in aware of the software flaw, before the attack which they had not made public. Days after the attack the US Congress introduced a bill prevent the government from stockpiling cyberweapons.
We hope your have enjoyed the video, tell us if you think there were any more important or high profile breaches which you experienced. Please stay tuned for our upcoming video on the major threats to be aware of in 2018. And as always be vigilant when online.