## Case Study: $450,000 Google Cloud API Key Compromise

A translation app with a Google Cloud backend experienced a catastrophic API key compromise that resulted in $450,000 in charges over 1.5 months. The app had been running consistently at $1,500/month for years before the incident.

### What Happened:
- The GCP API key was leaked.
- 19 billion characters of translations were processed without the owner's knowledge
- No warning emails from Google Cloud about the anomalous usage
- Google Cloud refused to provide a full refund, offering only $50k in credits
- The actual cost to Google for the resources used was estimated at 1-20% of the charged amount

