As streaming grows with new content creators and viewers practically by the minute, Twitch has gathered quite a following as being one of the best places to watch fellow gamers stream their experiences. While it may gather in viewers easily, the growth of its userbase has, unfortunately, resulted in problems like the "hate raids" situation. Supposedly in retaliation to Twitch's new anti-hate raid features, the entire platform has been hacked in immense detail, including sensitive user information.
An anonymous user recently uploaded a torrent file to 4chan claiming to have hacked Twitch in its entirety. While people looked through the files in question, they found that the file includes Twitch's source code including early development comments, top streamer payout receipts, and even encrypted passwords.
The file in question is incredibly huge, around 125 GB in size, and requires time to go through. As people are shifting through what they've found of the leak, they're advising all Twitch users to go ahead and change their passwords, recommending them to activate two-factor authentication at least until everything dies down.
When asked if two-factor authentication is safe, those who have looked through the data have responded that the leak doesn't seem to have that information, meaning that may be the best way for users to protect their information at this time. Where there doesn't seem to be a report of user payment details being in the information posted publicly, passwords being openly on the internet leaves Twitch's users vulnerable to identity fraud regardless. The hacker has also stated that this was only the first batch of information they've obtained from their efforts, and top streamer payment totals being in that batch doesn't look good for the next one.
It's incredibly terrifying to think one person was able to hack an entire media giant's website to this degree and post the information they've gathered with ease all because they didn't like being unable to harass others. It serves as a reminder to any user of an online platform to keep their information close and keep it updated and secure the best they can.
Active and paying Twitch users should quickly go and change their passwords, if they're able, in order to protect their account from any malicious activity that may come from the data breach being posted online. While the verdict is out on if the data leak has two-factor identification information within it, those who can should activate it for extra security on their Twitch account for the moment, if only to prepare for whatever else the hacker's pulled from the service's servers.