Your Passwords May Be Exposed: ‘MIX NEW HQ’ Leaked 197,127 Logins

HEROIC analysts identified a large combolist titled "MIX NEW HQ PART 2" shared on Telegram on 28-Feb-2023. The file contains 197,127 records, each combining an email address with a plaintext password and a URL linking that login back to the site it came from.

Why This Is Dangerous

In combolist slang, "HQ" typically means high quality, a signal to buyers that the credentials in the file have been checked and are believed to still work. Combined with the sheer size of this dump, nearly 200,000 records, that makes it especially attractive to attackers looking to run large-scale automated login attempts. Because the passwords are stored in plaintext, there is no cracking step standing between the file and an active attack.

What Was Exposed

• Email addresses
• Plaintext passwords
• Associated URLs

Why This Matters

A list of 197,127 supposedly verified credentials gives attackers enormous reach for credential stuffing, the practice of feeding stolen logins into bots that test them across banking, email, retail, and social media sites in bulk. Anyone in this file who reused a password elsewhere is at risk of account takeover, and a single compromised email account can cascade into financial fraud or identity theft if it is used to reset passwords on other services.

How This Combolist Was Assembled

Large mixed combolists like this one are usually stitched together from multiple older breaches, phishing campaigns, and stealer malware logs, then run through checker tools that filter out dead logins and keep only the pairs confirmed to still authenticate. The word "mix" in the title signals that the credentials were not pulled from a single source, but merged and re-verified before being packaged for distribution on Telegram.

Check If You Are Affected

Given the scale of this leak, it is worth checking whether your email address appears in this file or in any other breach HEROIC has indexed. HEROIC's free breach scanner searches a database of more than 400 billion exposed records in seconds. If your email turns up, change that password immediately and avoid reusing it anywhere else.