Mercora popular AI recruiting startup, has confirmed a security incident related to a supply chain attack involving the open source project LiteLLM.
The AI startup told TechCrunch on Tuesday that it was “one of thousands of companies” affected by a recent compromise of the LiteLLM project, which was linked to a hacking group called TeamPCP. Confirmation of the incident comes as extortion hacking group Lapsus$ claimed to have targeted Mercor and gained access to its data.
It was not immediately clear how the Lapsus$ gang obtained the data stolen from Mercor in the TeamPCP cyberattack.
Founded in 2023, Mercor works with companies like OpenAI and Anthropic to train AI models using specialist domain experts such as scientists, doctors and lawyers from markets including India. The startup claims it facilitates over $2 million in daily payments and has been valued at $10 billion following a $350 million Series C round led by Felicis Ventures in October 2025.
Mercor spokesperson Heidi Hagberg confirmed to TechCrunch that the company “acted quickly” to contain and remediate the security incident.
“We are conducting a thorough investigation supported by leading third-party forensic experts,” Hagberg said. “We will continue to communicate directly with our customers and contractors, where appropriate, and dedicate the necessary resources to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.”
Earlier, Lapsus$ claimed responsibility for the apparent data breach on its leak site and shared a sample of data purportedly taken from Mercor, which TechCrunch reviewed. The sample included material referencing Slack data and what appeared to be ticketing data, as well as two videos purportedly showing conversations between Mercor’s AI systems and contractors on its platform.
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Hagberg declined to answer follow-up questions about whether the incident was related to Lapsus$’s claims or whether customer or contractor data had been accessed, exfiltrated or misused.
The LiteLLM compromise initially surfaced last week after malicious code was discovered in a package associated with the Y Combinator-backed startup’s open source project. Although the malicious code was identified and removed within hours, the incident came under scrutiny due to the widespread use of LiteLLM on the Internet, with the library downloaded millions of times per day, according to security firm Snyk. The incident also prompted LiteLLM to make changes to its compliance processes, including move on from controversial startup Delve to Vanta for compliance certifications.
It remains unclear how many companies were affected by the LiteLLM incident or whether any data was exposed, as investigations continue.
Jagmeet covers startups, technology policy updates and all other major technology developments in India for TechCrunch. He previously worked as a senior correspondent at NDTV.
You can contact or check Jagmeet’s outreach by sending an email mail@journalistjagmeet.com.
