BlackSpigotMC data breach

Breach date: 2019-07-14. Added to this index: 2019-07-17. Accounts affected: about 140K. Domain: blackspigot.com.

What happened

In July 2019, the hacking website BlackSpigotMC suffered a data breach. The XenForo forum based site was allegedly compromised by a rival hacking website and resulted in 8.5GB of data being leaked including the database and website itself. The exposed data included 140k unique email addresses, usernames, IP addresses, genders, geographic locations and passwords stored as bcrypt hashes.

Breach data sourced from Have I Been Pwned, used under CC BY 4.0. Additional breach metadata provided by XposedOrNot. DataExposed is an independent service and is not affiliated with or endorsed by either.

What was exposed

  • Device information: Technical details an app or website recorded about your device: make and model, operating system version, screen size, language, carrier, and sometimes the device name or advertising ID.
  • Email addresses: The email address you used to register or log in. It is the most common field in breaches because it doubles as your username on most sites.
  • Genders: The gender or sex recorded on your profile, usually picked from a list at signup, sometimes with a title such as Mr or Ms or a gender identity option beyond male and female.
  • Geographic locations: A general location recorded on your account, such as a country, state, city, postcode or region, either typed in by you or estimated from your IP address.
  • IP addresses: The network addresses your devices used when you signed up, logged in or posted, recorded by almost every website in its access logs.
  • Passwords: The secret you use to sign in, stored by the breached service either in plain text, in a scrambled form called a hash, or encrypted. How it was stored decides how quickly it can be recovered.
  • Usernames: The handle or login name you chose for an account, which may be public on forums, games and social platforms or used privately to sign in.

What to do now

  1. Check whether your own address is in this dataset with the free email breach check.
  2. Change the password on this service and every other site where you used the same password.
  3. Turn on two-factor authentication on your email account first, because it is the reset path for everything else.
  4. Treat calls and messages that quote real details about you as hostile until you verify them another way.

Frequently asked questions

What data was leaked in the BlackSpigotMC breach?

The BlackSpigotMC breach exposed Device information, Email addresses, Genders, Geographic locations, IP addresses, Passwords, Usernames. About 140K accounts were affected.

Was I affected by the BlackSpigotMC breach?

Run the free email breach check with the address you used on that service. It will tell you whether your address appears in this dataset.

What should I do about the BlackSpigotMC breach?

Change the password on that account and everywhere you reused it, then turn on two-factor authentication. Passwords from this breach are traded and tried automatically against other sites.

Next steps