According to Engadget , in February 2023, Reddit said it had been the victim of a hack that collected internal documents, dashboards, code, and contracts, along with information from some advertisers and current and former employees of the company. At the time, it appeared that none of the data was made public.
Hacking group unlikely to expect Reddit to comply with its demands
In a post called The Reddit Files, BlackCat claimed to delete the information if Reddit paid the hackers $4.5 million and changed its API price increase.
BlackCat gained access through a scheme that tricked Reddit employees into visiting a website designed to look like the company’s intranet portal. One employee fell for the trick, allowing the hackers to steal his login credentials and a second authentication code. The employee later self-reported the bug, and experts believe the security breach did not affect Reddit users’ personal information.
But months later, the hackers went public with their plans amid a public outcry from the Reddit community over Reddit’s API price hikes. Rising costs are forcing popular third-party apps like Narwhal and Apollo to shut down, with Apollo founder Christian Selig saying he would need to spend $20 million a year to stay in business. Developers also fear that losing third-party apps will lead to more censorship and fewer opportunities for ad revenue.
Despite protests from the Reddit community, the company is moving forward with its plans. In an interview with The Verge , Reddit CEO Steve Hoffman said, “These people are mad, they’re mad because they used to get something for free, and now it’s not going to be free anymore.” While Reddit has shown no signs of reversing its decision, some advertisers have paused their advertising on the site while the outage continues.
It’s unclear how BlackCat’s new move will impact API pricing, and Reddit has yet to comment on whether the company will comply with the price increase. BlackCat claims Reddit ignored its previous two attempts to reach out in April and June, and there’s little hope that its ultimatum will make a difference. “We believe Reddit will not pay any money for their data,” BlackCat said in the post. “We will make the data public.”
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