There’s a entire shady trade for individuals who need to monitor and spy on their households. A number of app makers market their software program — generally known as stalkerware — to jealous companions who can use these apps to entry their victims’ telephones remotely.
But, regardless of how delicate this information is, an rising variety of these firms are dropping enormous quantities of it.
In accordance with information.killnetswitch’s tally, counting the most recent information exposures of Cocospy and Spyic, there have been not less than 23 stalkerware firms since 2017 which might be identified to have been hacked or that leaked clients’ and victims’ information on-line. That’s not a typo: At the very least 23 stalkerware firms have both been hacked or had a big information publicity in recent times. And 4 stalkerware firms had been hacked a number of occasions.
Cocospy and Spyic are the primary stalkerware firms in 2025 to have inadvertently uncovered delicate information. The 2 surveillance operations left messages, photographs, name logs, and different private and delicate information of tens of millions of victims uncovered on-line, in line with a security researcher who discovered a bug that allowed them to entry that information.
Within the case of Cocospy, the corporate leaked 1.81 million buyer e-mail addresses, and Spyic leaked 880,167 buyer e-mail addresses. That’s a complete of two.65 million e-mail addresses, after eradicating duplicate addresses that appeared in each breaches, in line with an evaluation by Troy Hunt, who runs data breach notification web site Have I Been Pwned.
In 2024, there have been not less than 4 huge stalkerware hacks. The final stalkerware breach in 2024 affected Spytech, a little-known adware maker primarily based in Minnesota, which uncovered exercise logs from the telephones, tablets, and computer systems monitored with its adware. Earlier than that, there was a breach at mSpy, one of many longest-running stalkerware apps, which uncovered tens of millions of buyer assist tickets that included the non-public information of tens of millions of its clients.
Beforehand, an unknown hacker broke into the servers of the U.S.-based stalkerware maker pcTattletale. The hacker then stole and leaked the corporate’s inner information. Additionally they defaced pcTattletale’s official web site with the aim of embarrassing the corporate. The hacker referred to a current information.killnetswitch article the place we reported pcTattletale was used to watch a number of entrance desk check-in computer systems at a U.S. lodge chain.
On account of this hack, leak and disgrace operation, pcTattletale founder Bryan Fleming mentioned he was shutting down his firm.
Shopper adware apps like mSpy and pcTattletale are generally known as “stalkerware” (or spouseware) as a result of jealous spouses and companions use them to surreptitiously monitor and surveil their family members. These firms usually explicitly market their merchandise as options to catch dishonest companions by encouraging unlawful and unethical habits. And there have been a number of courtroom circumstances, journalistic investigations, and surveys of home abuse shelters that present that on-line stalking and monitoring can result in circumstances of real-world hurt and violence.
And that’s why hackers have repeatedly focused a few of these firms.
Eva Galperin, the director of cybersecurity on the Digital Frontier Basis and a number one researcher and activist who has investigated and fought stalkerware for years, mentioned the stalkerware trade is a “delicate goal.”
“The individuals who run these firms are maybe not probably the most scrupulous or actually involved concerning the high quality of their product,” Galperin advised information.killnetswitch.
Given the historical past of stalkerware compromises, that could be an understatement. And due to the dearth of care for safeguarding their very own clients — and consequently the non-public information of tens of hundreds of unwitting victims — utilizing these apps is doubly irresponsible. The stalkerware clients could also be breaking the regulation, abusing their companions by illegally spying on them, and, on prime of that, placing everybody’s information at risk.
A historical past of stalkerware hacks
The flurry of stalkerware breaches started in 2017 when a gaggle of hackers breached the U.S.-based Retina-X and the Thailand-based FlexiSpy again to again. These two hacks revealed that the businesses had a complete variety of 130,000 clients all around the world.
On the time, the hackers who — proudly — claimed duty for the compromises explicitly mentioned their motivations had been to reveal and hopefully assist destroy an trade that they take into account poisonous and unethical.
“I’m going to burn them to the bottom, and go away completely nowhere for any of them to cover,” one of many hackers concerned then advised Motherboard.
Referring to FlexiSpy, the hacker added: “I hope they’ll crumble and fail as an organization, and have a while to mirror on what they did. Nonetheless, I worry they could attempt to give start to themselves once more in a brand new type. But when they do, I’ll be there.”
Regardless of the hack, and years of unfavourable public consideration, FlexiSpy remains to be energetic immediately. The identical can’t be mentioned about Retina-X.
The hacker who broke into Retina-X wiped its servers with the aim of hampering its operations. The corporate bounced again — after which it received hacked once more a 12 months later. A few weeks after the second breach, Retina-X introduced that it was shutting down.
Simply days after the second Retina-X breach, hackers hit Mobistealth and Spymaster Professional, stealing gigabytes of buyer and enterprise data, in addition to victims’ intercepted messages and exact GPS places. One other stalkerware vendor, the India-based SpyHuman, encountered the identical destiny a couple of months later, with hackers stealing textual content messages and name metadata, which contained logs of who known as who and when.
Weeks later, there was the primary case of unintended information publicity, reasonably than a hack. Spy Fone left an Amazon-hosted S3 storage bucket unprotected on-line, which meant anybody may see and obtain textual content messages, photographs, audio recordings, contacts, location, scrambled passwords and login info, Fb messages, and extra. All that information was stolen from victims, most of whom didn’t know they had been being spied on, not to mention know their most delicate private information was additionally on the web for all to see.
Different stalkerware firms that over time have irresponsibly left clients’ and victims’ information on-line are Household Orbit, which left 281 gigabytes of non-public information on-line protected solely by an easy-to-find password; mSpy, which leaked over 2 million buyer data in 2018; Xnore, which let any of its clients see the non-public information of different clients’ targets, which included chat messages, GPS coordinates, emails, photographs, and extra; MobiiSpy, which left 25,000 audio recordings and 95,000 photographs on a server accessible to anybody; KidsGuard, which had a misconfigured server that leaked victims’ content material; pcTattletale, which previous to its hack additionally uncovered screenshots of victims’ units uploaded in actual time to an internet site that anybody may entry; and Xnspy, whose builders left credentials and personal keys within the apps’ code, permitting anybody to entry victims’ information; and now Cocospy and Spyic, which left victims’ messages, photographs, name logs, and different private information, in addition to clients’ e-mail addresses, uncovered on-line.
So far as different stalkerware firms that truly received hacked, there was Copy9, which noticed a hacker steal the information of all its surveillance targets, together with textual content messages and WhatsApp messages, name recordings, photographs, contacts, and browser historical past; LetMeSpy, which shut down after hackers breached and wiped its servers; the Brazil-based WebDetetive, which additionally received its servers wiped, after which hacked once more; OwnSpy, which offers a lot of the back-end software program for WebDetetive, additionally received hacked; Spyhide, which had a vulnerability in its code that allowed a hacker to entry the back-end databases and years of stolen information from round 60,000 victims; Oospy, which was a rebrand of Spyhide, shut down for a second time; and the most recent mSpy hack, which is unrelated to the beforehand talked about leak.
Lastly there may be TheTruthSpy, a community of stalkerware apps, which holds the doubtful document of getting been hacked or having leaked information on not less than three separate events.
Hacked, however unrepented
Of those 23 stalkerware firms, eight have shut down, in line with information.killnetswitch’s tally.
In a primary and thus far distinctive case, the Federal Commerce Fee banned SpyFone and its chief government, Scott Zuckerman, from working within the surveillance trade following an earlier security lapse that uncovered victims’ information. One other stalkerware operation linked to Zuckerman, known as SpyTrac, subsequently shut down following a information.killnetswitch investigation.
PhoneSpector and Highster, one other two firms that aren’t identified to have been hacked, additionally shut down after New York’s lawyer common accused the businesses of explicitly encouraging clients to make use of their software program for unlawful surveillance.
However an organization closing doesn’t imply it’s gone without end. As with Spyhide and SpyFone, a number of the similar homeowners and builders behind a shuttered stalkerware maker merely rebranded.
“I do assume that these hacks do issues. They do accomplish issues, they do put a dent in it,” Galperin mentioned. “However for those who assume that for those who hack a stalkerware firm, that they are going to merely shake their fists, curse your title, disappear in a puff of blue smoke and by no means be seen once more, that has most undoubtedly not been the case.”
“What occurs most frequently, once you truly handle to kill a stalkerware firm, is that the stalkerware firm comes up like mushrooms after the rain,” Galperin added.
There’s some excellent news. In a report final 12 months, security agency Malwarebytes mentioned that the usage of stalkerware is declining, in line with its personal information of shoppers contaminated with one of these software program. Additionally, Galperin studies seeing a rise in unfavourable evaluations of those apps, with clients or potential clients complaining they don’t work as meant.
However, Galperin mentioned that it’s potential that security corporations aren’t nearly as good at detecting stalkerware as they was, or stalkers have moved from software-based surveillance to bodily surveillance enabled by AirTags and different Bluetooth-enabled trackers.
“Stalkerware doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Stalkerware is an element of an entire world of tech-enabled abuse,” Galperin mentioned.
Say no to stalkerware
Utilizing adware to watch your family members shouldn’t be solely unethical, it’s additionally unlawful in most jurisdictions, because it’s thought of illegal surveillance.
That’s already a big purpose to not use stalkerware. Then there may be the problem that stalkerware makers have confirmed time and time once more that they can not hold information safe — neither information belonging to the purchasers nor their victims or targets.
Other than spying on romantic companions and spouses, some individuals use stalkerware apps to watch their youngsters. Whereas one of these use, not less than in america, is authorized, it doesn’t imply utilizing stalkerware to snoop in your youngsters’ cellphone isn’t creepy and unethical.
Even when it’s lawful, Galperin thinks dad and mom shouldn’t spy on their youngsters with out telling them and with out their consent.
If dad and mom do inform their youngsters and get their go-ahead, dad and mom ought to steer clear of insecure and untrustworthy stalkerware apps and use parental monitoring instruments constructed into Apple telephones and tablets and Android units which might be safer and function overtly.
Recap of breaches and leaks
Right here’s the entire checklist of stalkerware firms which have been hacked or have leaked delicate information since 2017, in chronological order:
Up to date on February 20, 2025, to incorporate Cocospy and Spyic as the most recent set of buggy stalkerware apps.
In the event you or somebody you understand wants assist, the Nationwide Home Violence Hotline (1-800-799-7233) offers 24/7 free, confidential assist to victims of home abuse and violence. If you’re in an emergency scenario, name 911. The Coalition Towards Stalkerware has sources for those who assume your cellphone has been compromised by adware.
