Data theft is not a new face within darknet corridors.
This dark web vice has already been found to be rising, with bank data sales increasing to monumental peaks.
Hackers are now also trading Facebook logins, selling the commodity for a meager sum of £3 (or $3.92 USD).
This information was provided by research conducted recently by Money Guru. The current state of affairs may be linked to a recent data breach of 50 million Facebook accounts.
The study also discovered the dump of hacked email logins on darknet marketplaces. These credentials are considered easily accessible to persons with particular web tools.
Additionally, the sale of financial data was found to take the cheap turn, with credit and debit card credentials being sold for £92.60 ($121 USD) and £65.30 ($85.32 USD), respectively.
Concerning Findings
The study conducted by Money Guru checked details involving the most-used darknet platforms available today.
Particularly, Dream Market was selected as one of the study samples just to highlight a reality that is, expectedly, representative of the dark web environment.
Dream Market was compared to other main darknet trading places like Wall Street Market and Berlusconi Market. The idea was to elucidate pricing information about people’s personal data on sale.
From the results of the study, what stood out clearly was the fact that personal data happens to attract a rather cheap price tag.
This is obviously contrary to popular belief about the value of victims’ personal information to potential criminals.
Indeed, this aspect raises concerns about the nature of darknet-supported data theft.
A case-by-case perspective may go a long way to shed light on the troubling state of affairs as far as data security is concerned.
Facebook Data Breach the Culprit
The upsurge in availability of Facebook login credentials could be tied to a recent Facebook hack in late-September that opened unauthorized access to 50 million accounts.
Experts assert that this occurrence was made possible by an exploitation of bugs existing in Facebook’s code that allowed cybercriminals to steal digital keys, also referred to as access tokens.
Woman facing data breach.
Hackers are now also trading Facebook logins, selling the commodity for a meager sum of £3 (or $3.92 USD).
Up to the time of reporting, details surrounding the event were still unclear even though some U.K. users reported to have received login messages that expressed the vulnerability of their account’s security.
For this, Facebook was forced to use fresh verification processes to confirm user identity and aid the community in accessing their accounts.
Similarly, an additional 40 million users suffered from the hacking incident in which their accounts were logged out to pave way for a process to reset digital keys.
What Should Facebook Users Do?
As a security precaution, Facebook recommended in a statement that users should check login information within their accounts.
In Facebook’s Security and Login section, the tab “Where You’re Logged In” provides a list of devices signed in to a particular account. This also includes details concerning the location of such devices.
Then, in case a user discovers logged in devices that they do not recognize, they may remove them from the list immediately.
Another tip is for users to change their login passwords. Adopting complex passwords is an effective way to stay above water as far as data theft is concerned within Facebook usage.