Video live streaming service Twitch has confirmed a major data breach of the company’s servers, The Verge reported.
The hacker was able to access the servers due to a misconfiguration change.
Tweeting about the breach, Twitch wrote: “We can confirm a breach has taken place.”
“Our teams are working with urgency to understand the extent of this. We will update the community as soon as additional information is available.”
The video streaming platform admitted that an error in a Twitch server configuration change exposed the data to the Internet, allowing the hacker access. The company, however, said there was no indication that login credentials had been exposed, before adding that full credit card numbers were not exposed either.
So far, hackers have leaked data such as the company’s streaming service source code and details of creator payouts. On the 4chan message board, an anonymous account released a 125GB torrent earlier in the day. The poster claimed that the torrent included the entirety of Twitch.
The anonymous poster has also labelled the leak as “part one”, suggesting that more such leaks could be in the offing come.
While the leak does include personal information such as creator payments, it doesn’t appear to account passwords, email accounts or addresses of Twitch users, The Verge reported.
The leaker instead appeared to have focused more on sharing Twitch’s company tools and information.
Twitch itself is unsure about how much data the hacker accessed. It said it was still trying to understand the breach and asking some users to change their account passwords.
The leak could end up being damaging for the game streaming service, especially for creators who are reliant on Twitch to keep their information and earnings secure. The hack comes in the wake of the weeks-long protest under the #DoBetterTwitch movement urging the streamer to improve its service. Streamers also took an off day in August in protest against the company’s seeming lack of action against hate raids.
