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Data breaches → Wishbone (2016)

Was your data in the Wishbone (2016) breach?

2016 · wishbone.io · ~2,247,314 accounts exposedHigh severity · 7/10

Wishbone (2016) (wishbone.io) suffered a data breach in 2016 that exposed around 2,247,314 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 August 2016, the mobile app to "compare anything" known as Wishbone suffered a data breach. The data contained 9.4 million records with 2.2 million unique email addresses and was allegedly a subset of the complete data set. The exposed data included genders, birthdates, email addresses and phone numbers for an audience predominantly composed of teenagers and young adults.

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 Wishbone (2016) breach exposed and what each item actually enables:

Dates of birth

Date of birth is a permanent identifier used to verify identity by phone. Combined with a name and address it is often enough to impersonate you.

Phone numbers

Enables SIM-swap attacks (hijacking your number to intercept SMS codes), smishing, and voice scams that appear to come from your bank.

Names and usernames

Links this leak to your other accounts — a reused username lets anyone build a profile of you across platforms.

Email addresses

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.

Also listed in this breach: Auth tokens, Dates of birth, Email addresses, Genders, Names, Phone numbers, Usernames.

What to do if you were affected

These steps are ordered for this specific breach — the most urgent action given what leaked comes first.

  1. Dates of birth: Never confirm your date of birth to an inbound caller — hang up and dial the organisation back on a published number.
  2. Phone numbers: Move two-factor authentication off SMS to an authenticator app or passkey, and add a port-out PIN with your mobile provider.
  3. Names and usernames: Search your usual username to see what else it exposes, and use distinct handles for sensitive accounts.
  4. Email addresses: Treat any message referencing this service with suspicion, and never act on links in unexpected emails.
  5. 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 10 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.

Check if your email was exposed.Nullivo's free scan checks your own verified email against known breaches — including Wishbone (2016) — in 30 seconds. No password, no signup, and we only ever scan your own email. Run your free scan →

Frequently asked questions

What data was exposed in the Wishbone (2016) breach?

The Wishbone (2016) breach exposed dates of birth, phone numbers, names and usernames, email addresses. Date of birth is a permanent identifier used to verify identity by phone. Combined with a name and address it is often enough to impersonate you.

How many people were affected by the Wishbone (2016) breach?

Around 2,247,314 accounts were exposed, making it a large breach.

What should I do if I had a Wishbone (2016) account?

Never confirm your date of birth to an inbound caller — hang up and dial the organisation back on a published number. 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 Wishbone (2016) breach affected you, these breaches exposed comparable information — worth checking too, since leaked datasets are routinely combined.

See all breaches we cover →