10 Largest Data Breaches Since 2000 - Millions Affected

In light of the MySpace photo breach (due to their negligence) a couple of months ago, I got to wondering about other recent data breaches. It turns out Attrition.org keeps a Data Loss Archive and Database that contains known data breaches since 2000. Records include date, number affected, groups involved, summaries, and links to reported stories and updates. It’s surprisingly detailed and even better, it’s all available for download.

The above graphic shows the 10 largest data breaches which affected millions. I thought the 800,000 records thieved from UCLA a couple of years ago (that my information was unfortunately a part of) was a lot. That’s nothing compared to these.

Notice the higher frequency as we get closer to the present?

Source: FlowingData