Earlier this month, Facebook faced a huge data breach in which data of more than 533 million users from 106 countries had leaked online. This data included phone numbers, Facebook IDs, birthdates, etc. So, if you too are worried about this data breach or any other data breach online, you must want to check whether your data is secure or not. So, here we are listing some ways to find out if your phone number and email have leaked online in a data breach.
Find If Your Phone Number and Email Leaked
There is no way to get complete details of a data breach or your details that were hacked. However, you can check if your email or phone number was leaked recently or previously.
1. Have I Been Pwned
‘Have I been pwned’ is one such free website where you can find if your email id and phone number were part of any data breach. To use the website’s free tool follow the below-mentioned steps:
1. Go to ‘https://haveibeenpwned.com/’ on any device or search the website on Google.
2. Once the web page like the above screenshot appears, enter your email or phone number in the international format and click on the ‘pwned’ tab next to it.
3. The web page will show up a list of how many times your data was leaked.
When you scroll down, you will also find all the web pages through which your data was leaked.
2. Avast Hack Check
You can also use Avast’s Hack Check tool to check if your email address has been leaked. To be noted, this tool doesn’t let you check if your phone number is leaked. To check your mail leak, follow these steps:
1. Visit Avast’s Hack Check tool page and enter your email address in the given box.
2. Click on ‘Check Now’ and it will show the results if your data have been leaked.
Avast will also send you a mail with details of the data breach and you can check the same in your inbox and fix the issue.
3. The News Each Day
Another tool for checking if your phone number was leaked in the Facebook data breach is a website called The News Each Day. Here, you can input your phone number to find if it was part of the breach. However, this website is for US users only.
According to the website, in order to protect user privacy, it generates random phone numbers starting with the same five digits as your number and 99 such fake numbers and one real number to the server. So it can never know which is your real number.
What to do to keep your details safe?
If you find that your details are compromised or even if they are safe, it’s always a good idea to change your passwords. Also, set a strong and unique password that wasn’t used anywhere else. Apart from that, here are some other tips you can follow to further secure your several online accounts like email, Facebook, Instagram, etc.
1. Always use the 2FA (two-factor authentication) for your Facebook, Instagram, and other accounts that offer this. This will reduce the risk of hacking your account.
2. Also, remove phone-based 2FA and try to set up the 2FA app if the account allows it.
3. If you think your phone number has leaked several times earlier, consider changing your phone number as well.
4. Also, keep yourself updated with the latest and most common online scams.
5. You can also safeguard your data by using a more secure messaging app.
So, these were some ways to check if your personal data including phone number and email ID have been leaked in a data breach. Also, now you know some of the tips to keep your data safe online. So, share this article with others and stay tuned for more such tips!