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More than 471 million victim notices were issued in the first half of 2026, compared with 297.5 million for all of last year
The Identity Theft Resource Center tracked 1,803 data compromises in the first half of 2026, putting the year on pace to surpass the record 3,321 incidents recorded in all of 2025. That figure outpaces the 297.5 million victim notices the ITRC recorded across all of 2025.
A single breach involving Instructure Holdings' Canvas education platform accounted for an estimated 275 million of those notices, or roughly 58% of the H1 total, according to the ITRC. Supply chain attacks generated another 280.6 million victim notices from just 38 initial breach events, affecting 206 total entities.
The surge comes as artificial intelligence is making attacks easier to execute. One in four malicious breaches between March 2025 and February 2026 were AI-enabled, a 56% increase over the prior year, according to an IBM $IBM study based on 602 organizations globally. Those AI-enabled breaches — driven by deepfake impersonation and AI-enabled malware — cost companies an average of $6 million, roughly $1 million above the global breach average of $4.99 million.
