DHAKA: A new study shows that 18 percent of US online adults have their personal information stolen, such as Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, and bank account data, some 7 percent higher than that of July 2013, CNET reports.

Pew Research Center carried out the study on 1,002 US adults on January 2014 and released the findings on Monday.

More people are becoming victims of cybercrime, especially who maintained an email or social-networking account compromised or taken over without their permission was at 21 percent since July 2013,  according to the findings.

The study was released amid spreading of Heartbleed bug across the Internet last week showing how easily people`s online data could be accessed. The bug is potentially capable to expose people’s usernames and passwords on sites like Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Pinterest.

In the past few months, tens of millions of customers at Target, Nieman Marcus experienced massive data breaches, along with other breaches into University of Maryland and smaller Web sites, like Kickstarter.

‘The consequences of these flaws and breaches may add insult to injury for those who have already experienced some kind of personal information theft,’ Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project senior researcher Mary Madden wrote in a blog post Monday.

BDST: 1224 HRS, APR 15, 2014