UK relatively unscathed despite surge in data breaches

The UK’s cyber defences appear to be holding up better than most despite a major rise in data breaches around the world, with the list headed by the US, Russia, Spain, France, and Turkey.

The figures, compiled by Surfshark, show over 110 million accounts were leaked in the second quarter of 2023, equivalent to 855 accounts being breached every minute. This is 2.6 times the number of breaches in the first quarter of the year (43.2 million).

The top five most breached countries account for around 68% of all breached accounts during the second quarter of this year. Having been the second most-breached country in the prior quarter, the US stands first in the second quarter of 2023. It represents a whopping 49.8 million breached accounts. The leaked American accounts account for 45% of the total in Q2, having increased by 830% from 5.4 million in the prior quarter.

Russia had the second-highest number of breached accounts in the second quarter of 2023, up to 15.3 million from 6.8 million in Q1.

Spain saw a total of 3.7 million leaked accounts in the second quarter of 2023, a relatively slight increase from 3.1 million in Q1.

Meanwhile, France saw 3.4 million accounts breached in the second quarter of 2023, a slight increase from 3.2 million accounts in the prior quarter. Despite the rise in leaked accounts, France maintains its fourth-place ranking, which it also had in the first quarter of the year.

Turkey was fifth in the number of accounts breached in the second quarter of 2023, up from 25th in Q1. The last three months saw 2.8 million Turkish accounts leak, which is a significant increase of over 22 times compared with the previous quarter’s 120,000 accounts.

Regionally, the changes in breach rates are not uniform. In the second quarter of this year, Asia, Africa, and Antarctica saw a downturn, while North America, Europe, Oceania, and South America experienced an increase in leaked accounts.

North America has experienced the highest number of account breaches this quarter — 51.3 million. Being the third most breached region in Q1, North America saw the number of breaches go up by 806%. The US is the biggest contributor within the region, accounting for 97% of the 51.3 million breached accounts.

Breached European accounts have also increased — the number grew by 56% from 17.9 million in Q1 to 28 million in Q2. More than half of all leaked European accounts in Q2 are Russian, followed by Spanish and French (around 13% and 12%, respectively).

The UK has not escaped scot-free, however, with figures for Q2 showing that 914,990 accounts were breached during the period, put the country in 9th position; in Q1 the UK was 17th on 262,969.

Surfshark lead researcher Agneska Sablovskaja said: “Such an alarming increase in data breaches highlights that the current data protection measures are not sufficient, and sensitive information remains at risk as cybercriminals continue to access it in ever higher numbers.”