23andMe, a genetic testing company, has announced that it believes some of its users’ data was compromised in a credential-stuffing attack. In a credential-stuffing attack, hackers use stolen usernames and passwords from other websites to gain access to user accounts on other websites.
The attacker behind the incident has leaked an initial sample of 1 million data points about users with Ashkenazi Jewish heritage to a popular hacking forum. The initial sample includes people’s full names, birth years, location information, and more. The attacker also reportedly published a separate sample with information about more than 300,000 users with Chinese heritage earlier in the week.
23andMe believes that the attacker gained access to users’ accounts by reusing passwords stolen from breaches of other companies’ systems. This suggests that many of the affected users may have recycled their passwords across multiple websites.
A spokesperson from 23andMe affirmed their awareness of this threat actor’s actions, stressing their commitment to investigate further. They suspect that the attacker gained unauthorized access to 23andme.com accounts by exploiting reused passwords obtained from other security breaches.
23andMe asserts that there is currently no evidence of a security incident within their systems.
The sources for this piece include an article in Axios.