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By Marni Rose McFall
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More than 100 million passwords have been stolen in a data leak.
A database that contained 149 million account usernames and passwords has been removed after a researcher reported to the hosting provider that there had been an exposure.
This is what you need to know and how to find out if your password has been leaked.
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Why It Matters
Studies suggest that billions of U.S.-based credentials are exposed each year. The leaks impact an estimated hundreds of millions of Americans each year. DemandSage, a data reporting and analytics solutions platform, reported in December that in the U.S. alone, there had been some 2.28 billion leaks related to passwords in 2025.
DemandSage reported that part of the reason for the leaks is people reusing passwords–some 84 percent of people do this. Just 34 percent of people are updating their passwords monthly.
That same report stated that 30 percent of global data breaches are caused by weak passwords, and poor practices cause 81 percent of company breaches.
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What To Know
According to Wired, the database, which had 149 million passwords, housed 48 million for Gmail, 17 million for Facebook and 420,000 for the cryptocurrency platform Binance. The person who discovered the leak was Jeremiah Fowler, a longtime security analyst, according to Wired.
Fowler spoke to Forbes about the breach, and said: “The publicly exposed database was not password-protected or encrypted,” adding that there was “A massive 96 GB of raw credential data.”
How To Check If Your Password Has Been Leaked
If you’re concerned that your password may have been leaked, you should check. You can do this through websites like Have I Been Pwned. Users can go to the website and enter their email addresses in the search bar. The site will show you if your address has been involved in any breaches over the past decade.
For those affected, it is recommended that you quickly change your password and that passwords are regularly updated.
For security reasons, people are also encouraged to enable two-factor authentication (2FA).
What People Are Saying
A spokesperson for Google told the Daily Mail: “We are aware of reports regarding a dataset containing a wide range of credentials, including some from Gmail. This data represents a compilation of ‘infostealer’ logs, credentials harvested from personal devices by third-party malware, that have been aggregated over time. We continuously monitor for this type of external activity and have automated protections in place that lock accounts and force password resets when we identify exposed credentials.”
What Happens Next
Password leaks occur regularly, so to help keep your data safe, stay up to date with relevant reporting to stay informed on the issue.
Beyond this, users are encouraged to switch from passwords to passkeys—biometric-based authentication such as fingerprints or facial recognition—which Google has recommended as being the most secure option.
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