The massive data breach of the "largest database in history," which allegedly contains 4TB worth of data, demonstrates how important it is to opt out of sharing data.

The hackers allegedly responsible for the breach (going by "USDoD") originally posted the leak in 2024/4/8 on the infamous dark web data breach site, BreachForums. After that, USDoD and Hi Breachforums[sic]Im[sic] proud to say that access is the largest database. This is the entire population of the United States, the United Kingdom and California."

In this article, the database is from national public data, background checks, and individual lookup sites that provide API lookups to companies, the USDoD states that the database contains 2.9 billion rows of data from 2019 to 2024, and is 200GB compressed or 4TB uncompressed. It is not the first time that we have seen such a phenomenon. USDoD said it would provide the database sales forド350 million and provide buyers with "credentials" for the database's servers.

Now, vxunderground, a self-proclaimed "largest collection of malware source code, samples, and papers on the Internet," has investigated the leak.

In a 6-2 X (formerly Twitter) post, vxunderground explained that it discovered that USDoD intended to leak data and requested a copy of the database to confirm the validity of the hacker's claims.

vxunderground states that the files sent for verification are 277.1GB uncompressed and "real and accurate" data verified via vxunderground, which searches for data from consented individuals

The data present for people in the United States includes full names, addresses, and address history dating back more than three decades in some cases, And social security numbers were included. Through the database, vxunderground was also able to find the family members they examined, even if these relatives died - parents, brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. By examining these consenting individuals, vxunderground was able to discover that the database contained information about those who died.This includes that some were dead for nearly 20 years.

One of the main points of this data breach is the fact that there were no people in the database who used all kinds of data opt-out services.1 Anyone who did not use the data opt-out service was "immediately discovered" by vxunderground.

This clearly demonstrates how important it is to opt out of sharing data. If you are concerned about how your data is available, you can use the Data deletion service.  A good example of this is from Surfshark, one of the best VPN providers.1 Surfshark's Incogni service (and other data deletion services) allows you to delete data from your online database so that you know that your personal information is not visible to anyone.