Suspected 4chan Hack Could Expose Longtime, Anonymous Admins
1 min read
Summary
Speculation is mounting that the controversial image board 4chan has been hacked, following a series of outages and the appearance of a message on the site suggesting that it had been compromised.
4chan is reputed to be a hotbed for extremist views, conspiracy theories, and the planning of DDoS attacks, with some accusing it of being behind the January 6, 2021, invasion of the US Capitol.
If 4chan has indeed been hacked, this could expose the data of its users and administrators; it is not known whether the site itself has officially confirmed that it was hacked, or whether the rumors are true.
4chan has long claimed to offer users complete anonymity, however, critics say this has given users a false sense of security, especially as the site does collect IP addresses and other user information.
It has been suggested that the 4chan backend systems, along with a list of administrator and moderator usernames, plus associated email addresses, have been leaked.
