Visualization of a data leak

The potential impact that data leakage can have on a country, both on a national level as well as on an individual level, can be wide reaching and potentially catastrophic. In January 2013, several South African companies became the target of a hack attack, resulting in the breach of security measures and the leaking of a claimed 700000 records. The affected companies are spread across a number of domains, thus making the leak a very wide impact area. The aim of this paper is to analyze the data released from the South African breach and to visualize the extent of the loss by the companies affected. The value of this work lies in its connection to and interpretation of related South African legislation. The data extracted during the analysis is primarily personally identifiable information, such as defined by the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act of 2002 and the Protection of Personal Information Bill of 2009.