Game streaming platform Twitch has confirmed that hackers have managed to obtain a significant amount of data about its users. On Wednesday, files with a total volume of more than 100 gigabytes appeared on Internet forums, which contain internal company information and data on streamers' earnings.
The documents show that streamers on Twitch (the service is owned by Jeffrey Bezos' Amazon) have made millions of dollars over the past two years. T
witch said it is urgently trying to establish exactly what data was stolen. In a tweet, the company promises to “keep the community informed as soon as more information becomes available.”
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. Thank you for bearing with us.
— Twitch (@Twitch) October 6, 2021
The information about the hacking was indirectly confirmed by well-known Twitch streamers. “My earnings are 100% correct,” Fortnite streamer Calc told the BBC.
The documents that appeared on the 4chan imageboard list payments to streamers, including famous ones, which were made from August-September 2019 to October 2021. The streamers CriticalRole, Canadian xQC and American Summit1g earned the most during this period. Channel CriticalRole received $ 9.5 million for the period, follows from the leak.
The hackers who claim to have hacked Twitch also say they managed to get the original computer code that the platform runs on.
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According to the source of the leak, the 129 GB files contain:
- Twitch.tv source code with comments;
- Service clients for different platforms
- Twitch Internal Operations Security Center Tools.
Analysis: Offensive Leak
Joe Tidy to orrespondent Bi-bi-si on cybersecurity
Twitch is known to keep its secrets carefully, such as how much is paid to streamers. Therefore, this leak looks extremely offensive for the company.
Competitive companies like YouTube Gaming are offering streamers huge salaries. Therefore, the consequences of a hack can be very significant.
In addition to information about payments, the documents, apparently, contain the source code of the platform, and even technical specifications for future projects.
And it seems that at least some of this information is reliable.
According to security experts, the files contain information that only Twitch employees could have access, such as information about internal servers.
And if all this is confirmed, then we will talk about the largest leak in my memory – all the most valuable data of an entire large company were immediately posted on the Internet.
Streamers' income may not be limited to the funds they receive from Twitch: some of them have sponsorship contracts with other companies and may earn on other platforms. Plus, many of the top streamers – if not all of them – have long since grown into full-fledged media companies with their own employees and the added cost of running a business. Therefore, the published amounts do not fully reflect the direct income of the stars of this industry.
Some documents have a “first part” mark in the files, so it is possible that the archives were not fully uploaded.
The author of the earliest known BBC post with the file accompanied it with a commentary in which he called the community around the platform “a disgusting toxic cesspool.” The author stated that the purpose of the leak is to provoke “competition”.
In recent months, Twitch has seen frequent “hate-raids” – users get together to insult Asian and African streamers. In September, streamers went on strike for one day over such racist antics.
