Hacker claims to have obtained personal information on 1 billion Chinese citizens from the Shanghai police.

A hacker claims to have obtained a trove of personal information on 1 billion Chinese citizens from the Shanghai police.

If true, it would be one of the largest data breaches in history, according to experts.

Last week, an anonymous internet user posted on the hacker forum Breach Forums offering to sell the more than 23 terabytes of data for approximately $200,000 (£165,000).

The Shanghai National Police (SHGA) database was compromised in 2022.

According to the post, this database contains many TB of data and information on billions of Chinese citizens.

According to the report, databases contain information on 1 billion Chinese national residents and several billion case records.

By Sunday afternoon, the hashtag “data leak” had been removed from Weibo.

It comes as China pledges to strengthen online user data privacy protection.

China passed legislation last year governing how personal information generated within its borders should be handled.