🇫🇷 French, 9 October 2026, data breaches
80% of French People Have Data for Sale on Darknet, Says Gendarmerie Expert
French gendarmerie estimates that nearly 80% of French people have their data for sale on the darknet due to hacking incidents.
The darknet is a superimposed and private network on the internet that is not indexed by classical search engines.
The gendarmerie’s estimate is based on the increasing number of hacking incidents and data breaches in France, with 43.4 million compromised accounts in the first half of 2026, a 62% increase from the second half of 2025, according to a Surfshark study.
The French government has been targeted by several high-profile data breaches, including a massive hacking incident at the French tax authority this summer, and a breach at the French Shooting Federation that allowed criminals to locate and burglarize the homes of shooters to steal their guns.