Security News > 2023 > January > Twitter claims leaked data of 200M users not stolen from its systems
Twitter finally addressed reports that a dataset of email addresses linked to hundreds of millions of Twitter users was leaked and put up for sale online, saying that it found no evidence the data was obtained by exploiting a vulnerability in its systems.
"In response to recent media reports of Twitter users' data being sold online, we conducted a thorough investigation and there is no evidence that data recently being sold was obtained by exploiting a vulnerability of Twitter systems," the company said.
Today, Twitter said that another dataset containing email addresses linked to 200 million Twitter users that reportedly got leaked online earlier this month was not obtained by exploiting the vulnerability patched in January 2022.
The company added that "Based on information and intel analyzed to investigate the issue, there is no evidence that the data being sold online was obtained by exploiting a vulnerability of Twitter systems. The data is likely a collection of data already publicly available online through different sources."
Twitter failed to explain in today's statement how the Twitter users' leaked data was accurately linked to email addresses associated with their accounts.
In December 2022, the Irish Data Protection Commission announced that it launched an inquiry and "Raised queries in relation to GDPR compliance" following news reports that the personal information of 5.4 million Twitter users was leaked online.