Russian cybercriminal forum hacked, user details exposed

Oh dear. How unfortunate.

A Russian cybercrime forum appears to have suffered a data breach, spilling details of users.

Risk intelligence experts at Flashpoint say that the elite Russian-language cybercrime forum “Maza” – previously known as “Mazafaka” – has been hacked, exposing information about forum members including the following data:

• User id
• Username
• email
• Password (hashed and obfuscated)
• Crt_filename
• Crt_pass
• Icq (when available)
• Aim (when available)
• Yahoo (when available)
• Msn (when available)
• Skype (when available)

Normally when an online forum suffers a data breach, its users have to be on their guard against attacks from cybercriminals and fraudsters who might try to exploit the leaked details.

That still applies here, of course. But I imagine users of the notorious Maza forum may also be concerned quite what law enforcement agencies will do with the information if it falls into their hands too…

Found this article interesting? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter, Mastodon, or Threads to read more of the exclusive content we post.

Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is an award-winning keynote speaker who has given presentations around the world about cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. A veteran of the computer security industry since the early 1990s, he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows, makes regular media appearances, and is the co-host of the popular "Smashing Security" podcast. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky, or drop him an email.