Inside the 16 Billion Credential Leak: The Infostealer Engine Behind the Biggest Breach Yet

In this episode, we break down the true scale and mechanics behind the largest credential leak ever recorded—over 16 billion login credentials, most of them exfiltrated by infostealer malware.We dive into how this happened: from the malware-as-a-service (MaaS) model enabling even low-skill threat actors to deploy powerful stealers, to how credentials are harvested from infected systems, bundled into "logs", and sold on dark web marketplaces.You'll learn about the rise of credential stuffing attacks that use these logs to hijack user accounts at scale, bypassing traditional defenses with distributed botnets and evasion tactics. We examine the ecosystem behind it all—how groups like Nova Sentinel operate, where data gets hosted, and how anti-analysis methods help them stay hidden.We also detail the best current defenses—multi-factor authentication (MFA), fingerprint-based detection, rate-limited login systems, and how organizations should handle suspicious IPs and user agent anomalies. You'll hear mitigation tactics sourced from OWASP, CISA, and expert threat research from Gatewatcher, DataDome, and more.This isn't just about malware. It's about how credential theft has become a billion-dollar economy—automated, distributed, and dangerously efficient.

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