French ANTS Agency Confirms Data Breach

The French government's Agence Nationale des Titres Sécurisés, known as ANTS or France Titres, confirmed a data breach on April 15 that exposed personal information from an undisclosed number of users, following a hacker's claim to have stolen up to 19 million records. The agency, responsible for issuing national identity documents, passports, driver's licenses, and immigration papers, detected the security incident on its ants.gouv.fr portal, which handles online requests for these services.

According to ANTS officials, the breach involved data from both individual and professional accounts but did not grant unauthorized access to user portals or financial details. The compromised information includes full names, dates and places of birth, email and mailing addresses, phone numbers, account identifiers, login details, gender, and civil status. While the exact number of affected individuals remains under investigation, the hacker, using the alias "breach3d," advertised the data for sale on underground forums starting April 16, before the agency's public disclosure on April 20. Cybersecurity reports indicate the information has not been widely leaked as of now.