If you’ve ever received a phishing email attempting to capture your Apple ID login – like the recent App Store subscription ones – there’s a good reason for that: they can be sold on the dark web for $15.39 each.
That’s the most valuable login on the market for anything outside of the financial services sector, according to research conducted by top10vpn.com …
Interestingly, when it comes to financial accounts, bank accounts are not the most highly-prized logins. The site found that PayPal credentials fetch the highest price, at an average of $274 each, compared to $160.15 for a bank account. However, the value depends on the balance of the account – typically selling for around 10% of the available balance.
Prices for other accounts vary.
Higher-value credentials include:
Vital communications services, like Skype and T-Mobile, are worth less than $10 each. With these details, fraudsters could send messages containing phishing links to trusted contacts or get around security features that rely on SMS verification.
On the dark web, even logins to dating sites are valuable, and tend to earn bidders on average $3.11 – allowing criminals to ‘catfish’ potential matches, sparking up relationships to manipulate people for financial gain.
- Western Union: $101
- Debit card: $67.50
- Credit card: $50
For online shopping logins, the most valuable is for Macy’s, at $15.34 – a little less than the value of an Apple ID. If a scammer managed to obtain all of your logins, and sold the lot, they would fetch $1200.
The site recommends the use of a VPN (of course), alongside two-factor authentication.
