According to an initial report from Video Games Chronicle on Wednesday, an anonymous hacker breached Twitch’s source code and leaked it by posting a 100GB torrent online which was later confirmed by Twitch. And the hacker didn’t stop there, he or she also leaked the million-dollar payout details of the top Twitch streamers on the platform.
Twitch confirmed the hacking in a tweet saying, “We can confirm a breach has taken place. Our teams are working to understand the extent of this. We will update the community as soon as additional information is available. Thank you for bearing with us.” Twitch streamers have also come forward and confirmed that the earnings list that was leaked online is also real and not a fake one circulating on social media. According to a BBC report about the incident, a Fortnite streamer called “BBG Cale” said, “The earnings list got my figure 100% correct.” While another streamer also said that the information was “accurate”
The documents which included sensitive financial information went viral on online forums with payment records going as far back as August 2019 to October 2021. Among the top names of streamers include American Summit1g, Canadian xQC and Dungeons & Dragons channel CriticalRole. The security breach comes at a very crucial time when major rival companies of Twitch are also trying to come out in the spotlight such as YouTube Gaming by offering to pay impressive salaries to popular gaming streamers. This breach would have a far greater impact on Twitch going as far as an income setback for the gaming platform.
Security experts talked with Cyber Reporter Joe Tidy of BBC and said that the files also include internal server data that is exclusively for Twitch employees and dubbed as one of the biggest data leaks from a single company. Twitch is in a tight spot right now with its most guarded and priced information exposed to the rest of the world as a result of a mere hack.
