What Happened
In mid-2018, the home design platform Houzz suffered a data breach that exposed approximately 51.7 million records, which the company discovered in late December 2018 and disclosed to affected users in February 2019. An unauthorized third party gained access to a file containing user data, compromising personal information including names, email addresses, IP addresses, geographic locations (city, state, country), salted and encrypted passwords, usernames, and linked social media profiles used for account authentication. The breach did not involve sensitive financial information such as Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, or bank account details. Houzz responded by immediately launching an investigation with a leading forensics firm, notifying law enforcement authorities, and recommending that all affected users reset their passwords as a precautionary measure.
