What seems to be the largest password collection of all time has been leaked on a popular hacker forum. A forum user posted a massive 100GB TXT file that contains 8.4 billion entries of passwords, which have presumably been combined from previous data leaks and breaches. 

According to the post author, all passwords included in the leak are 6-20 characters long, with non-ASCII characters and white spaces removed. The same user also claims that the compilation contains 82 billion passwords. However, after running our own tests, the actual number turned out to be nearly ten times lower – at 8,459,060,239 unique entries.

What to do if your password was leaked?

If you suspect that one or more of your passwords may have been included in the RockYou2021.txt (the name of the file with the stolen passwords) collection, we recommend taking the following steps in order to secure your data and avoid potential harm from threat actors:

   - Use our personal data leak checker and leaked password checker to see if your data has been leaked in this or other breaches.

   - If your data has been compromised, make sure to change your passwords across your online accounts. You can easily generate complex passwords with our strong password generator or consider using a password manager.

   - Enable two-factor authentication (2FA) on all of your online accounts.

   - Watch out for incoming spam emails, unsolicited texts, and phishing messages. Don’t click on anything that seems suspicious, including emails and texts from senders you don’t recognize.

Source: cybernews.com

Author: Edvardas Mikalauskas

Link: https://cybernews.com/security/rockyou2021-alltime-largest-password-compilation-leaked/