by Cassandre Coyer at Bloomberg Law
Jerico Pictures Inc., a background-check company doing business as National Public Data, exposed the personal information of nearly 3 billion individuals in an April data breach, a proposed class action says.
On April 8, a cybercriminal group by the name of USDoD posted a database entitled “National Public Data” on a dark web forum, claiming to have the personal data of 2.9 billion people, according to the complaint filed Thursday in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida, which said the group put the database up for sale for $3.5 million.
If confirmed, the breach could be among the biggest ever, in terms of the number of individuals affected. A 2013 breach of Yahoo! compromised the data of an estimated 3 billion individuals.
It’s unclear exactly when or how the breach occurred, according to the complaint, and the provider still hasn’t provided notice or warning to affected individuals as of the filing.
To conduct its business,…