10 Billion Passwords Leak Online, Highlighting the Need for Biometrics

In the most extensive instance of such a breach in recent memory, nearly 10 billion passwords have been leaked online, according to a discovery by Cybernews. The massive password compilation of an alarmingly massive 9,948,575,739 passwords was pasted in a plaintext file on a popular hacking forum page.

According to the analysis by the platform, the passwords, pasted in a file named rockyou2024.txt by a person with the username ‘ObamaCare’, are a mix of previously leaked passwords, and about 1.5 billion new ones. These are real world passwords, being actively used by individuals across the world.

This file comes after a similar file called rockyou2021.txt leaked back in 2021, which at over 100GB contained 8.4 billion passwords, and was the biggest single password dump leaked at the time.

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A Major Threat Worldwide

The platform states that such a massive amount of data can be utilized by an attacker to target any system that isn’t safeguarded against brute-force attacks. Unfortunately, this means more platforms than not, as security is not prioritized as much as it should be on many digital platforms.

Combine this with other data leaks that are already on different hacking forums and the black market of user credentials, and the file can contribute to a massive number of possible data breaches, fraud and instances of theft.

Replacing Passwords with Something Better

The massive breach as others before it highlights the absolute inability of conventional passwords to protect users’ private information and credentials from being hacked or stolen. This is why the world is moving on to better, passwordless authentication and security solutions, like facial recognition secured with liveness detection.

Biometric authentication and security mechanisms are intrinsically linked to the user’s person, which makes it highly difficult to steal or replicate in the first place. Add to that the protection that 3D liveness verification solutions like the ones from Facia provide by being able to differentiate between a real person and a deepfake or other spoof, and a much better solution for protecting data is found.

Many platforms are already moving towards biometric verification and liveness detection, and those not are expected to soon be considering biometric liveness checks for the enhanced protection that they offer.