Almost 50 million Turks have personal data leaked online: Reports

Almost 50 million Turks may have had key personal information leaked online by hackers, it has emerged. If proven, the leak would be one of the largest of its kind.

The leak, which first emerged late on Monday, includes data on national ID numbers, addresses and birthdates - placing those affected at risk of identity theft and fraud.

Hackers behind the leak released information for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, his predecessor Abdullah Gul, and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

“Who would have imagined that backwards ideologies, cronyism and rising religious extremism in Turkey would lead to a crumbling and vulnerable technical infrastructure?” the hackers who posted the data said in a message. “Bit shifting isn’t encryption.”

The site appears to be hosted by an Icelandic group that has previously divulged leaks online.

“We really shouldn’t elect [Donald] Trump, that guy sounds like he knows even less about running a country than Erdogan does,” the hackers said.

However, the validity of the leak is yet to be confirmed.

The AP news agency on 4 April ran 10 non-public Turkish ID numbers against the names in the dump, and found that eight were a match.

The Daily Dot website dedicated to internet culture, however, has gone further, suggesting that the leak could be based on a large February data dump.

Turkey’s communications minister Binalu Yildirim called the leaks a “very old story".

"A similar allegation was made in 2010. This issue is brought to the agenda from time to time. It is now being served like a new story. These outdated reports are not newsworthy,” Yildirim said. 

The leak was claimed by an Anonymous-linked hactivist group and reportedly could have contained information stolen from the Turkish national police.

The details of the leak could not be independently verified but the hackers also said that they had done it to "take action against corruption" in the nation's government.

Turkish police on Tuesday detained almost 70 businessmen, local officials and teachers in a new nationwide sweep against supporters of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's arch foe preacher Fethullah Gulen, reports said.

The arrests come amid a growing controversy about press freedom, which has seen opposition paper’s targeted and social media sites like YouTube and Twitter occasionally taken down.