XBIZ Data Breach
The 2017 XBIZ data breach occurred on June 17, 2017, when the vBulletin forum database of XBIZ (xbiz.com), a premier B2B news publisher and digital entertainment business media network, was exfiltrated by threat actors and circulated on dark web forums.
Exposed Data Types
6- Email addresses
- Usernames
- Passwords
- IP addresses
- Dates of birth
- Instant messaging identities
About This Breach
What information was affected in the XBIZ incident?
The leaked user table (Xbiz_vb_users_6_17_2017.csv) comprises accounts belonging to media executives, affiliates, webmasters, and industry professionals. The incident compromised records for 28,177 unique industry members, exposing:
- Account Identifiers: Usernames, registration dates, and dates of birth.
- Contact & IM Credentials: Canonical email addresses, legacy messaging handles (Skype, ICQ, MSN, AIM), and website URLs.
- Authentication Secrets: Salted MD5 password hashes and per-user cryptographic salts.
- Network Telemetry: Logged client IP addresses.
How many accounts were affected?
Rigorous RFC canonical parsing and deduplication confirmed 28,177 unique valid email addresses.
Technical analysis and security risks
Salted MD5 hashes are vulnerable to high-speed dictionary and brute-force cracking using modern GPU clusters. Exposing industry member emails alongside passwords and IP addresses enables targeted extortion, spear-phishing, and credential stuffing across corporate hosting and affiliate dashboards.
Recommended actions for affected users
Professionals with accounts on XBIZ should:
- Immediately reset passwords across services where their XBIZ password or email was utilized.
- Implement multi-factor authentication (MFA / 2FA) across enterprise email and affiliate networks.
Verification and editorial method
LeakData compares the incident name, date, affected-record count, and exposed data types with accessible sources. Unverified fields are not presented as facts, and records are updated when new evidence becomes available.
Report missing or incorrect information
