QUESTION
Did the Ashley Madison email list leak in a PDF format?
ANSWER
The Ashley Madison data breach, which occurred in July 2015, resulted in the release of user details from the infidelity website Ashley Madison. While the hackers, known as "The Impact Team," claimed responsibility for the breach, they initially leaked the data on the dark web using an Onion address, accessible only via the Tor network. The information was eventually distributed in various formats across the internet by other actors. Although specific file formats such as PDF could have been used by individuals to share subsets of the data, the initial large-scale releases were not in a standardized PDF format but instead were primarily in the form of raw databases and CSV files. These files contained sensitive personal information including names, email addresses, and transaction details of users which were extracted and shared widely on file-sharing networks and torrent sites.
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