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2.9 billion hit in one of the largest data breaches ever — full names, addresses and SSNs exposed (www.tomsguide.com)

submitted 2 months ago by fmstrat@lemmy.nowsci.com to c/technology@lemmy.world

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[–] solrize@lemmy.world 39 points 2 months ago (5 children)

There are only 1 billion SSNs possible with 9 digits, and at most around 350M living people who have them (the US population). This breach is international but SSN is a US thing.

[–] floofloof@lemmy.ca 7 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

And not all 9-digit numbers are used, so there are fewer than a billion. It sucks when organizations store them because the search space is so small it's relatively easy to unhash them in a stolen database.

[–] prime_number_314159@lemmy.world 6 points 2 months ago

A lot of businesses use the last 4 digits separately for some purposes, which means that even if it's salted, you are only getting 110,000 total options, which is trivial to run through.

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