The skull_roses Telegram Leak Exposed More Records Than a Small City

HEROIC Analysts Find 28,371 Stolen Records in the skull_roses Telegram Stealer Log

In July 2025, HEROIC analysts confirmed a stealer log dump uploaded to Telegram by a threat actor operating under the name skull_roses. The file contained 28,371 records harvested from infected devices, including plaintext passwords, email addresses, and URLs captured at the moment of infection. HEROIC verified the breach and indexed it in their dark web monitoring database on April 18, 2026.

Why Plaintext Passwords Make This Breach Especially Risky

Most leaked passwords are at least hashed, meaning attackers have to crack them before they are usable. Not here. The skull_roses log contains plaintext passwords — meaning every single credential is immediately ready to use. Attackers do not recieve a puzzle to solve; they recieve a working key. Combined with the email addresses in the same file, this data can be used to access accounts within seconds of the log being downloaded.

What Was Exposed in the skull_roses Breach

HEROIC confirmed the following data categories were present in this stealer log:

• Email Addresses
• Plaintext Passwords
• URLs (endpoint addresses and web services accessed from infected machines)

The URLs in stealer logs are often overlooked, but they reveal which services and platforms a victim was actively using — giving attackers a roadmap for targeted fraud.

Why This Matters: From One Leak to Full Account Takeover

A single leaked email and password pair can trigger a chain of events that is very difficult to stop once it has occured. Here is how that chain typically unfolds:

• Credential stuffing: Automated tools test the leaked credentials across hundreds of platforms simultaneously.
• Account takeover: Email, banking, and social media accounts are compromised before the victim notices anything wrong.
• Identity theft: Once inside an email account, attackers can reset passwords for nearly every other service the victim uses.
• Financial fraud: Access to URL history reveals exactly which financial platforms and shopping sites to target.

How Stealer Log Breaches Work

Stealer log malware is seperate from traditional viruses in that it operates silently and is designed to exfiltrate data rather than cause visible damage. It typically arrives through phishing links, cracked software downloads, or malicious browser extensions. Once installed, it records every password saved in the browser, captures keystrokes, and logs the URLs of every site visited. That data is compiled into a log file and sent back to the attacker automatically. The victim's machine may show no visible signs of infection for weeks or months.

Check If Your Data Appeared in the skull_roses Leak

HEROIC provides a free dark web scanner covering more than 400 billion records, including stealer log files like the skull_roses dump. If your email or password was captured on an infected device and ended up in this or any other breach, the scanner will find it.

Run a free scan at HEROIC.com to check if your credentials were exposed. Knowing is the first and most important step toward protecting your accounts from takeover and financial fraud.