Snapchat CEO's comments on India miff hackers who claim they leaked data of 1.7 million users

Anonymous hackers from India claim to have leaked data of 1.7 million Snapchat users in retaliation for CEO Spiegel's alleged uncharitable comments about India.

The hackers said they were in possession of the data for the past year after they found a vulnerability in the app. They decided to make it available on the Dark Web to mark their resentment against "arrogant" Spiegel's alleged reference to India as a "poor" country. The hackers have threatened to carry out more such attacks, if Spiegel does not apologise.

IBTimes UK has reached out to the company for a comment, but so far there have been no reports of Snapchat confirming their data was compromised.

Massive backlash came Snapchat's way, when a story by Variety magazine published on 11 April said Spiegel had said he was loath to expand to "poor" countries like India and Spain. Users in India came down heavily on the CEO and the hashtag #BoycottSnapchat started trending on Twitter. Users and even non-users of the app in India gave it a one star rating on the App Store resulting in a heavy fall in its rating.

The social media company, which recently went public, denied Spiegel made any such comments and said they were concocted by a former employee whose employment it had terminated over his poor performance.

"This is ridiculous. Obviously, Snapchat is for everyone! It's available worldwide to download for free," a spokesperson of the photo-sharing app said in a statement. "Those words were written by a disgruntled former employee. We are grateful for our Snapchat community in India and around the world," he added.