Bulletins

Huge Twitch data breach exposed the site's source code and revenue

Twitch streamers immediately began discussing the revenue payouts on their channels and on Twitter.

Phone with Twitch app

Twitch's source code was hacked Wednesday morning.

Photo: Caspar Camille Rubin/Unsplash

A hacking group claims to have breached a majority of Twitch's source code, and the group posted at least some of that data in downloadable links on 4chan Wednesday, including the revenue payout data for all Twitch streamers from 2019.

Twitch streamers immediately began discussing the revenue payouts on their channels and on Twitter, with some confirming that at least some of the revenue numbers are accurate after Twitch takes a 50% cut, and others expressing frustration that only the top few percentages of streamers make tens of millions of dollars from subscriptions.

The hacking group reportedly said that it posted the data to "foster more disruption and competition in the online video streaming space" and called Twitch a "cesspool." Twitch has come under increasing fire from streamers for failing to protect its users from "hate raids" and other forms of abuse on the platform.

Twitch did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Anna Kramer

Anna Kramer is a reporter at Protocol (Twitter: @ anna_c_kramer, email: akramer@protocol.com), where she writes about labor and workplace issues. Prior to joining the team, she covered tech and small business for the San Francisco Chronicle and privacy for Bloomberg Law. She is a recent graduate of Brown University, where she studied International Relations and Arabic and wrote her senior thesis about surveillance tools and technological development in the Middle East.

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