Data Breach

Threat actors leak Activision employee data on hacking forum

Data allegedly stolen from the American gaming giant Activision in December security breach were leaked on a cybercrime forum.

A threat actor leaked on the Breached hacking forum the data allegedly stolen from the gaming giant Activision in December 2022.

The threat actors claim to have obtained 19,444 unique records from an Activision Azure database amd is offering it for free. The leaked data contains names, phone numbers, job titles, locations, and email addresses of Activision employees.

Activision disclosed the data breach on February 21, 2023, it added that the incident took place in December 2022. According to the company, threat actors obtained the credentials of an HR employee through a smishing attack.

“The security of our data is paramount and we have comprehensive information security protocols in place to ensure its confidentiality. On December 4, 2022, our information security team swiftly addressed an SMS phishing attempt and quickly resolved it.”a company spokesperson told Bitdefender. “Following a thorough investigation, we determined that no sensitive employee data, game code, or player data was accessed.”

Bitdefender post highlights that the screenshots shared by vx-underground researchers show that the threat actor tried to phish several more employees who were not tricked into providing their credentials.

“Unfortunately, the same people failed to inform Activision’s security department about the attempted hack.” states the post.

While Activision pointed out that no sensitive employee data, game code, or player data was compromised as a result of the incident, the website Insider Gaming reported the exposure of sensitive employee details.

The availability of Activision employees’ data in the cybercrime ecosystem exposes them to social engineering attacks.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, data leak)

Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.

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