Paytm Says Its User Data Is Safe, Calls Firefox Monitor's Data Leak Report 'Unsubstantiated'

The digital payments company on Thursday told ABP Live that the data of Paytm users is completely safe and the claims of a data leak in August 2020 are "unsubstantiated".

The company mentioned that it was in touch with Firefox and its security tracking platform to resolve the issue. Image: Getty

A day after Firefox Monitor, a security tracker by Mozilla's findings of a massive data breach of Paytm surfaced, the digital payments company on Thursday said that the data of Paytm users is completely safe and the claims of a data leak in August 2020 are "unsubstantiated".

“The data of our users is completely safe and claims related to a data leak in the year 2020 are completely false and unsubstantiated. Our cybersecurity teams have conducted a thorough investigation and found that there has been no breach of our systems. It appears that a fake dump uploaded on the platform 'haveibeenpwned.com' wrongly alerted of a data breach on Firefox," a Paytm Mall spokesperson told ABP Live.

The company mentioned that it was in touch with Firefox and its security tracking platform to resolve the issue. "We would also like to add here the alleged data breach has no connection with Paytm," the spokesperson added.

To recall, Firefox Monitor, a security tracker by Mozilla's findings said that the digital payments platform Paytm was hit by a massive data breach two years back in which data of as many as 3.4 million Paytm users was comprised. The data breach exposed sensitive user information such as purchase history, email addresses and users' phone numbers.

On August 30, 2020, Paytm was breached. Once the breach was discovered and verified, it was added to our database on July 26, 2022, the security tracker wrote on its page. However, as per Firefox Monitor, payment details such as saved cards were not leaked during the Paytm data breach.

A website data breach happens when cyber criminals steal, copy, or expose personal information from online accounts. It’s usually a result of hackers finding a weak spot in the website’s security. Breaches can also happen when account information gets leaked by accident.

"It can sometimes take months or years for credentials exposed in a data breach to appear on the dark web. Breaches get added to our database as soon as they have been discovered and verified," Firefox Monitor had written on its page.