Data breaches → Hacking Team
Was your data in the Hacking Team breach?
2015 · hackingteam.com · ~32,310 accounts exposedHigh severity · 7/10
Hacking Team (hackingteam.com) suffered a data breach in 2015 that exposed around 32,310 accounts. If you had an account, some of your personal data may be circulating in leaked databases. The fastest way to know is to check your own email — free, in about 30 seconds, no password required.
What happened
In July 2015, the Italian security firm Hacking Team suffered a major data breach that resulted in over 400GB of their data being posted online via a torrent. The data searchable on "Have I Been Pwned?" is from 189GB worth of PST mail folders in the dump. The contents of the PST files is searchable on Wikileaks.
Breach details sourced from Have I Been Pwned, the industry-standard breach database. Risk analysis by Nullivo.
What was exposed, and why it matters
Not all breaches carry the same risk — what matters is which fields leaked. Here is what the Hacking Team breach exposed and what each item actually enables:
Personal correspondence can be used for blackmail or social engineering, and often contains other sensitive details you have forgotten sharing.
Puts you on spam and phishing lists, and confirms to attackers that you hold an account with this service — which makes impersonation emails more believable.
What to do if you were affected
These steps are ordered for this specific breach — the most urgent action given what leaked comes first.
- Private messages: Consider what was discussed on this service and whether anything needs changing (shared passwords, personal disclosures).
- Email addresses: Treat any message referencing this service with suspicion, and never act on links in unexpected emails.
- Check whether your own email appears in this breach — run a free scan to confirm before you spend time on the steps above.
How urgent is this now?
This breach is over 11 years old. Old credentials still cause harm — leaked passwords from a decade ago are still tried against new accounts every day.
Remember: a breach can't be "un-leaked" — once a database is out, it exists in countless copies. The goal is to make the leaked data useless: change what can be changed, lock down what can't, and remove what has been republished.
Frequently asked questions
What data was exposed in the Hacking Team breach?
The Hacking Team breach exposed private messages, email addresses. Personal correspondence can be used for blackmail or social engineering, and often contains other sensitive details you have forgotten sharing.
How many people were affected by the Hacking Team breach?
Around 32,310 accounts were exposed, making it a smaller, more targeted breach.
What should I do if I had a Hacking Team account?
Consider what was discussed on this service and whether anything needs changing (shared passwords, personal disclosures). You can check whether your own email appears in this breach with a free Nullivo scan — no password required.
Breaches that exposed similar data
If the Hacking Team breach affected you, these breaches exposed comparable information — worth checking too, since leaked datasets are routinely combined.
- Was your data in the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India breach? (2015, ~107,776 accounts)
- Was your data in the MDPI breach? (2016, ~845,012 accounts)
- Was your data in the AKP Emails breach? (2016, ~917,461 accounts)
- Was your data in the Ordine Avvocati di Roma breach? (2019, ~41,960 accounts)
- Was your data in the WHMCS breach? (2012, ~134,047 accounts)
- Was your data in the KnownCircle breach? (2016, ~1,957,600 accounts)