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NEWS

A massive data breach involving more than 26 Billion records has been reported.

Researchers found the stolen records on an unsecured website, and found that the records contain information from major apps such as Twitter, Weibo, MySpace, LinkedIn, Adobe and others. Information in the leak is said to also contain government organisation data from the US, Brazil, Germany, Philippines and Turkey.

It has been described as the Mother of all Breaches (MOAB).

While the info does not immediately let crooks access your bank accounts, it can be enough for them to start tricking you, or others into giving them access to more and more sensitive information.

Consumer should be on the look out for sneaky emails asking you to log in to accounts or to click on links. These types of attacks can be made to look legitimate by using some information from such data leaks. They may quote account numbers or mention information the crooks have learned about you in the data breach.

Many passwords were contained in the data. So, if you tend to use the same passwords across multiple platforms or apps it might be time to consider an update.