Yahoo hack: Company leaked details of every single person who uses it

The information includes some of the most personal details of each user

(Reuters)

Yahoo leaked the details of all the people who used it, it has said.

Some three billion accounts were compromised – the equivalent of half the people on Earth – in a 2013 hack. That accounts for everyone who used it at the time of the leak.

Yahoo had previously said that around one billion accounts were part of that hack when it disclosed it at the end of this year, already a unprecedentedly large leak of information. But it has now revised that total.

The information included some of the most personal information about each person, including their usernames, passwords, telephone numbers and dates of birth. Experts had already warned that it was sensible to presume that those details had been leaked, and protect them accordingly.

Parent company Verizon said that it had re-evaluated the number after it received new information from outside the company. It was bought by Verizon – and restructured into a group called "Oath" last year, in a deal that the disclosure of the hack threatened to ruin but still continued.

Earlier this year, the US Justice Department charged Russian hackers with cyber attacks on Yahoo that allowed them to steal information.