Discord Customer Service Data Breach Exposes Scanned IDs And User Data To Hackers

Discord's latest security screw-up is exactly the kind of nightmare privacy advocates have been warning about since platforms started demanding government IDs for "safety." The company confirmed this week that a breach at one of its customer service contractors exposed user information—including, in some cases, actual scanned IDs submitted for age verification. It's not a leak from Discord's own servers, they insist, but that's hardly any comfort when the data in question only existed because Discord began collecting it in the first place.

According to the company, the attacker compromised a third-party support vendor around September 20th. Discord disclosed the breach publicly in early October, saying the hacker accessed user names, emails, billing details, and internal support communications. The company stressed that passwords and full credit card numbers weren't stolen, but that "a small number" of government-issued ID images were. Those came primarily from ...