Mystery database containing sensitive info on 762,000 car-owners discovered by researchers


In early August, cybersecurity researchers from Cybernews discovered an unprotected database containing sensitive information on hundreds of thousands of Chinese individuals.

To this day, they haven’t figured out who the database belongs to, or why it was generated and left open in the first place. Using Elasticsearch, a search engine for databases, the team of researchers found a database containing details on 762,000 car owners, and their vehicles. The archive contained people’s names, ID numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, postal addresses, birth dates, vehicle identification numbers (VIN), car brand, car model, engine number, and vehicle color.

Read more…
Source: TechRadar News


Sign up for our Newsletter


Related:

  • PSA: Anyone can tell if you are using WhatsApp on your computer

    January 17, 2024

    Anyone who knows your WhatsApp number can figure out if you are only using the mobile app, or its companion web or desktop apps, a security researcher found. Tal Be’ery, the co-founder and CTO of crypto wallet maker ZenGo, found that it’s possible to determine whether a user on WhatsApp is using more than just the ...

  • 23andMe blames “negligent” breach victims, says it’s their own fault

    January 4, 2024

    In a surprising move, in a letter to legal representatives of victims of the recent 23andMe data breach, the company has laid the blame at the feet of victims themselves. 23andMe even goes as far as to claim that this wasn’t a data breach at 23andMe at all. The reasoning: “… unauthorized actors managed to access ...

  • 2023’s badly handled data breaches

    December 29, 2023

    Last year, researchers compiled a list of 2022’s most poorly handled data breaches, looking back at the bad behavior of corporate giants when faced with hacks and breaches. That included everything from downplaying the real-world impact of spills of personal information to failing to answer basic questions. Turns out this year, many organizations continue to make ...

  • UK: 767 sex crime victims affected by Norfolk police data leak

    December 27, 2023

    Hundreds of victims of sexual offences were among those to have personal details leaked as part of a huge police data breach. Norfolk and Suffolk constabularies revealed in August that a technical issue had led to sensitive raw data about crimes being mistakenly disclosed as part of responses to freedom of information requests. Among the data ...

  • Estonia: At least one case of extortion reported following Asper Biogene data leak

    December 25, 2023

    Investigations into the Asper Biogene data leak that came to light last week are ongoing, and there is already at least one known case of an attempt to extort money from an individual in connection with the data leak. When the data theft case came to light, police warned that the situation could be exploited by ...

  • Mr. Cooper leaks personal data of 14 million loan and mortgage customers

    December 19, 2023

    A major mortgage and loan company based in Dallas, working under the name Mr. Cooper Group Inc. has released more information on a recent breach. In a data breach notification, the company didn’t say what type of cyberattack caused the compromise of customer data, calling it a rather non-descriptive “External system breach (hacking).” For those unfamiliar ...