India has been identified as the second-most affected country by data broker breaches, with more than 1.8 crore (18.7 million) personal records of Indian citizens being compromised in the past 20 years through 10 data breaches, according to a report by data removal service Incogni.

The report found that data brokers, businesses that aggregate information from various sources and license it to other organisations, are increasingly at risk of experiencing a data breach.

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Of the 506 registered, US-based data brokers analysed by Incogni, 23 have suffered data breaches in the past two decades. At least 10 of these breaches involved the leak of 1 million or more user records, resulting in a total of 444.5 million records being exposed.

The US was the country most affected by data broker breaches, with 207.6 million personal records of citizens being compromised in the same period. The UK, Brazil, and Canada were also among the top five most affected countries.

The report highlighted the severity of the situation, with the number of cybercrime victims increasing by 69 percent in 2020 alone. The pandemic has led to a surge in cybercrime, resulting in nine data breaches during this period.

The People Data Labs breach was the most significant breach in each of the five most affected countries. This breach exposed 35.2 percent of breached US records, 42.1 percent of Brazilian records, over half of the Canadian and UK records, and more than two-thirds of Indian records.

The analysis of data broker breaches showed a decrease in the number of breaches in 2021, with only three reported. However, the report cautioned that data breaches are not always immediately discovered, and the accuracy of the information is yet to be confirmed.

Darius Belejevas, Head of Incogni, warned that data privacy is becoming increasingly alarming, and many people are still unaware of the hidden market in which data brokers operate.

He stressed that data brokers can experience data breaches like any other company, but they are the ones dealing with massive amounts of sensitive data.

The report suggests that the increase in data breaches in recent years highlights the urgent need for more robust data protection measures to safeguard personal information from cybercriminals.

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(Edited by : Soham Shetty)