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akerl_05/04/20251 replyview on HN

The overlap of "the entities that carry out data breaches on digital entities" and "the people who break into your house to steal stuff" is not really well correlated. This is for a variety of reasons, but the most boring is that hacking websites is way smoother when you're a faceless entity far from any kind of jurisdiction, and breaking into somebody's house is something you need boots-on-ground for.


Replies

autoexec05/04/2025

Scammers and thieves are using data brokers more and more all the time. They already buy up lists of rich elderly people, lists of people with dementia, and lists of people with low IQs or poor educations who are often easier to trick out of their cash.

Most criminals breaking into houses aren't buying up targeted lists of likely victims from data brokers yet, but it's effective so you should expect that the number of criminals turning to those resources will only increase.