Updated
October 4, 2024
From Equifax's $700M settlement to Yahoo's 3-billion-record breach, here are the largest data breach class actions in recent history — and where to find the ones still paying out.
Biggest Data Breaches of All Time
The digital age has made our lives much easier in many ways. If we need information in a hurry, we can rely on search engines to provide it quickly. That doesn't mean the internet is a safe place. Data breaches have affected countless businesses and their data, resulting in data breach lawsuits and class action settlements to recover damages on behalf of affected consumers. You can find current data breach lawsuits and class actions you may unwittingly be affected by:See our running list of ongoing data breach lawsuits and settlements.
Equifax Data Breach Class Action Settlement
In 2017, the consumer credit reporting agency Equifax agreed to pay $575 million and up to $700 million for losing the personal and financial information of almost 150 million people. This was all because they had unpatched the Apache Struts framework in one of their databases.Failure to fix that critical vulnerability and not informing the public for weeks didn't help their situation. They finally settled with the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and 50 states and territories for failing to take reasonable steps to secure its network.
Instagram Class Action Settlement
It seems that social media platforms where people voluntarily share details about their lives are not exempt from data breach lawsuits. In 2022, the Data Protection Commissioner in Ireland fined Instagram $403 million for violating children's privacy under General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) terms.The complaint revolved around data belonging to minors, such as phone numbers and email addresses. These were made more public when some young users changed their regular accounts to business accounts to access analytical tools. According to Instagram owner Meta, they planned to appeal the decision.
Uber Class Action Settlement
Uber is no stranger to lawsuits. They had already been involved in multiple class action lawsuits, resulting in a $8,435,800 class action settlement. However, this company has also been in the legal spotlight for breached user accounts. In 2016, the accounts of 57 million users and 600,000 drivers were breached. Rather than reporting the breach, Uber paid the culprit $100,000 to keep it quiet. For doing that, Uber was fined $148 million for violating state data breach notification laws.Home Depot
You don't expect a retail corporation to be caught up in a data breach lawsuit, but it was back in 2014. At the time, it was one of the largest data breaches, resulting in 50 million credit card numbers and 53 million email addresses being stolen in a five-month period. Home Depot had to pay credit card companies and banks at least $134.5 million and a further $19.5 million to affected customers.Yahoo Class Action Settlement
In 2018, Yahoo was involved in a data breach legal situation described as one of the largest in history. It involved over three billion records across data breaches and security intrusions between 2012 and 2016. The data involved were personally identifiable and sensitive information from Yahoo and its subsidiary, Aabaco Small Business LLC. As of 2026, the class action lawsuit was settled for over $117.5 million.Free settlement alerts
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Top 100 Data Breaches of All Time
The list includes 100 notable data breaches from various organizations, highlighting the most significant incidents that compromised *billions* (Yes, with a 'B') of consumer records, affecting personal information and financial data across all industries.| 100 Major Data Breaches | ||
| Yahoo (2013) | River City Media (2017) | Aadhaar (2018) |
| Indian Council of Medical Research (2023) | Spambot (2017) | Facebook (2021) |
| Marriott International (2018) | AT&T (2023) | MySpace (2016) |
| Exactis (2018) | Twitter (2022) | Equifax (2017) |
| eBay (2014) | Capital One (2019) | Quora (2018) |
| MyFitnessPal (2018) | LinkedIn (2021) | Sina Weibo (2020) |
| Yahoo (2014) | Adobe (2013) | Canva (2019) |
| Heartland Payment Systems (2008) | Target (2013) | Uber (2016) |
| Home Depot (2014) | Facebook (2019) | Evernote (2013) |
| LinkedIn (2012) | Dropbox (2012) | tumblr (2013) |
| US Bank (2024) | Sony PlayStation Network (2011) | Anthem (2015) |
| Experian/T-Mobile (2015) | JP Morgan Chase (2014) | Uber (2022) |
| LastPass (2022) | MongoDB (2019) | WattPad (2020) |
| Google Cloud (2020) | Instagram (2020) | Zynga (2019) |
| Cisco (2020) | MyCastingFile (2020) | Intel (2020) |
| Equifax (2017) | eBay (2014) | Tumblr (2013) |
| Panera (2018) | Microsoft (2019) | Newegg (2018) |
| Friend Finder Network (2016) | Elastic Search (2018) | First American Financial Corp. (2019) |
| Facebook (2018) | Twitter (2018) | Marriott (2020) |
| Nintendo (2020) | EasyJet (2020) | Zoom (2020) |
| MGM Resorts (2019) | Dixons Carphone (2018) | Cathay Pacific (2018) |
| Chegg (2018) | British Airways (2018) | Ticketmaster (2018) |
| MyHeritage (2018) | Timehop (2018) | SingHealth (2018) |
| Orbitz (2018) | Under Armour (2018) | Saks Fifth Avenue/Lord & Taylor (2018) |
| Panera Bread (2018) | Facebook (2018) | Uber (2016) |
| Deloitte (2017) | Verizon (2017) | Edmodo (2017) |
| Dun & Bradstreet (2017) | Verifone (2017) | InterContinental Hotels Group (2017) |
| GameStop (2017) | Arby's (2017) | Yahoo (2016) |
| FriendFinder Networks (2016) | Dailymotion (2016) | National Lottery (UK) (2016) |
| Weebly (2016) | Kimpton Hotels (2016) | Oracle MICROS (2016) |
| Wendy's (2016) | LinkedIn (2016) | Verizon Enterprise Solutions (2016) |
| 21st Century Oncology (2016) | UC Berkeley (2016) | Snapchat (2016) |
| Experian/T-Mobile (2015) | Ashley Madison (2015) | Anthem (2015) |
| Premera Blue Cross (2015) | Tile / Life360 (2024) | Dell (May 2024) |
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