If you ever wanted to learn about 7 biggest hacks of all time you’ve come to the right place. In this article, we will present you with the biggest computer hacks in the history.
Although term hack had lots of different meanings through the history, today it’s commonly associated with computers. The term is used to describe any breach into the computer system or computer network by exploiting their weaknesses. The term isn’t only limited to computers and can apply to smartphones or consoles and other similar devices. In modern times, the word hack started being used for making an action less complicated or easier to perform.
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To perform any type of hack, the hacker is often required to have an advanced knowledge of computer systems and their security. The only thing that can make a hack successful is breaching the security or bypassing it. There are various reasons why one would want to perform a hack like gaining knowledge and enhancing own skills, accessing to secret data and sharing it with the public, gaining profit or simply pointing out the weaknesses in the security of computer systems and computer networks. The last hackers are the most appreciated in the computer world and are often rewarded for their insights. One of the most recent cases is when Instagram rewarded 10-year-old with $10,000 for discovering a weakness in social media’s security that allowed him to change the code and delete the written content on user’s accounts. We doubt that this kid would be interested in our 5 easiest ways to hack your friends Facebook account, buy you may be, so check it out.
To compile our list of 7 biggest hacks of all time we consulted lists from tech-based magazines like Computer Science Degree Hub, Tech World, Alphr and Tested among others. We browsed through their lists and considered hacks that were the most dangerous, affected the most users, had the largest financial damage or caused a major data leak. The following 7 hacks were indeed the biggest ones.
7. Operation Shady Rat
Started in 2006, Operation Shady Rat, the last one in our list of biggest hacks of all time, is the name given to numerous hacks that targeted governments, international organizations, and defense contractors among others. It is estimated that 70 hacks were performed in more than 14 countries, resulting in amajor data leak of design schemes, personal contacts, emails and passwords and multiple other valuable information. Although the identity of the hackers was never confirmed, there is a rumor that the Chinese government could be behind all of this.
6. Spamhaus Hack
The Spamhaus Project is an organization that deals in anti-spam business, reducing spam emails and protecting email users from the unwanted post. In 2013, Spamhaus suffered a DDOS attack, a kind of attack that doesn’t allow the website to perform its designated activity. So, Spamhaus couldn’t protect its users from spam mail. Spamhaus servers were receiving traffic of 300Gbit/sec in one moment, making this attack the biggest DDOS attack in the history of the internet.
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5. Melissa Virus
With Melissa Virus, we will go a bit retro on our list 7 biggest hacks of all time. Created by David L. Smith in 1999, Melissa was a macro virus that had the ability to spread fast. It was disguised as an email attachment, which would break the Microsoft Word security and then send its copy to 50 people in the Microsoft Outlook address book. Just imagine that number. It was estimated that in one moment, 20% of the world’s computers were infected with the virus.
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4. Department of Defense Hack
In 1999, a teenager named Jonathan James managed to hack into the computer of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency that was part of the Department of Defense of the United States. After the hack, James planted a so-called “sniffer” that enabled him to gain access to messages, usernames and passwords of the Agency’s employees. James also unintentionally obtained a source code that had the role of controlling critical life-sustaining elements on International Space Stations. Being a minor, James was sentenced to house arrest and probation until he is 18 years old.
3. Mt. Gox Hack
Bitcoin is a virtual currency that can be exchanged for real money by numerous exchange companies. Some say that bitcoin is the currency of the future. By 2013, Mt. Gox was the biggest exchange in the business, handling more than 70% of exchanges. But in 2014, the company’s luck changed. Almost half of billion USD worth bitcoins were stolen from the company. The company never recovered and filed for bankruptcy in 2014.
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2. PlayStation Network Hack
You have probably read about this one on our list of biggest hacks of all time, online since it got a lot of coverage. This hack showed that consoles are not safe from being hacked. In 2011, personal data from 77 million accounts connected to the Play Station Network was exposed by a hack. To try and prevent the hack, Sony closed the network for almost 30 days. Out of 77 million, 12.3 million accounts had their credit card information exposed as well. It was the biggest data leak in the history of cyber-crimes.
1. TJX and Heartland Payment Systems Hack
The last of our 7 biggest hacks of all time is a dual one. We decided to put these two together because they were performed by the same man, Albert Gonzales, who is currently serving 20 years prison sentence because of his cyber crimes. First, he stole 45.6 million credit card numbers and from TJX and numerous other connected companies in the course from 2006 to 2007 that being the largest data leak in the history at the moment. Then in 2009, he participated in a hack that resulted in obtaining information about 100 million card transactions from Heartland Payment Systems.
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