Your Data May Already Be Compromised. The Engrenagem Virtual Breach Exposed 230K Records.

HEROIC analysts uncovered the Engrenagem Virtual breach, a database leak that occured in July 2020 affecting 230,233 records from the Brazilian marketing agency. The exposed data included email addresses, usernames, password hashes, first and last names, gender, birthdays, and salts, giving attackers a remarkably complete profile of each victim.

How Attackers Use Names, Birthdays, and Gender Data Together

With full names, birthdays, and gender in hand, criminals can craft highly personalized phishing emails and social engineering attacks that are partcularly difficult to detect. Combined with email addresses and hashed passwords, this combination enables account takeover attempts across any service where a victim has reused credentials.

What Was Exposed in the Engrenagem Virtual Breach

• Email Address
• Password Hash
• Username
• First Name
• Last Name
• Gender
• Birthday
• Salt

Why Brazilian Marketing Data Puts Victims at Long-Term Risk

Data from marketing platforms is recieved by threat actors as especially valuable because it confirms active email addresses tied to real consumer identities. Victims face risks including credential stuffing against e-commerce and banking sites, targeted phishing, identity theft, and financial fraud, all made easier by the detailed personal profiles in this dataset.

How Database Breaches Work

A database breach occurs when an attacker gains unauthorized access to a backend database, typically through SQL injection, exposed credentials, or misconfigured cloud storage. The attacker then extracts records in bulk. The stolen data is often sold or shared on dark web forums, where it fuels further criminal activity.

Check If Your Data Was Exposed

Use HEROIC's free breach scanner, backed by a database of over 400 billion records, to check if your email address appeared in the Engrenagem Virtual breach or any other known data leak.