Neopets, the virtual pet platform that was published in 1999 and has tens of millions of users today, made a frightening statement to the Personal Data Protection Authority. The platform announced that it has detected a cyber attack against some of its systems and that it has seen the data that is stated to have been seized from the platform on a website.
According to the statement made by the platform, hackers claimed that the information of 69 million people, old and new users, was seized in their sharing. In the said post, it was stated that the source codes and database of the platform were put up for sale. In a statement, Neopets stated that it has not yet been determined how many people were affected by the attack.
Identity and contact information of users was captured:
According to the statement made to KVKK, the data breach in Neopets took place on July 17, 2022 and was detected by the platform on July 20. It was shared that the personal data categories affected by the breach are identity, communication and transaction security. Neopets stated that research on this issue continues. It was said that there are also child users in the group of users who have captured the data.
Neopets reported that the number of people and registrations affected by the breach has not yet been determined, but there are 3.5 million active and 65 million inactive accounts registered on the platform. The platform announced that it has started working with a forensics firm to determine when and how the data leak occurred and which data was affected by the breach.