A data broker (also known as an information product company) is an organization that makes money by collecting your personal information, analyzing it, and licensing it out to be used by other companies for things like marketing purposes.
Data providers gather data from many different sources to create a profile of who you are. This profile includes things like your interests, hobbies, demographics, and even the products you use. Generally, data broker companies only deal with customers to collect information. A few of the top data brokerage companies are Epsilon, Acxiom, and Experian, but there are many data brokerages worldwide that make a hefty profit from aggregating and distributing consumers’ personal data.
Read more…
Source: McAfee
Related:
- 1,900 Signal users exposed: Twilio attacker ‘explicitly’ looked for certain numbers
August 16, 2022
The security breach at Twilio earlier this month affected at least one high-value customer, Signal, and led to the exposure of the phone number and SMS registration codes for 1,900 users of the encrypted messaging service, it confirmed. However, Signal – considered one of the better secured of all the encrypted messaging apps – claims the ...
- Twitter breach exposed anonymous account owners
August 5, 2022
A vulnerability in Twitter’s software that exposed an undetermined number of owners of anonymous accounts to potential identity compromise last year was apparently exploited by a malicious actor, the social media company said Friday. It did not confirm a report that data on 5.4 million users was offered for sale online as a result but said ...
- Hacker selling Twitter account data of 5.4 million users for $30k
July 22, 2022
Twitter has suffered a data breach after threat actors used a vulnerability to build a database of phone numbers and email addresses belonging to 5.4 million accounts, with the data now up for sale on a hacker forum for $30,000. Yesterday, a threat actor known as ‘devil’ said on a stolen data market that the database ...
- Chinese ride-sharing operator Didi slapped with $1.1B fine for breaching China data security laws
July 21, 2022
Didi Global has been fined 8 billion yuan ($1.18 billion) for breaching China’s cybersecurity and data security laws. The Chinese ride-sharing operator is accused of 16 illegal practices involving the collection of passenger data. Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) said Thursday Didi had violated the country’s cybersecurity and data security laws. The industry regulator pointed to ...
- Walmart-controlled flight booking service suffers substantial data leak
July 19, 2022
An Indian flight booking website majority-owned by US retail colossus Walmart has experienced a data breach, but is saying very little about what happened or the risks to customers. News of the breach emerged on Monday, when customers received a message. While the message to customers assures them that “no sensitive information pertaining to your Cleartrip account” ...
- 1.9m patient records exposed in healthcare debt collector ransomware attack
July 13, 2022
Professional Finance Company, a Colorado-based debt collector whose customers include hundreds of US hospitals, medical clinics, and dental groups, recently disclosed that private data – including names, addresses, social security numbers, and health records – for more than 1.9 million people was exposed during a ransomware infection. In a notice posted on its website, PFC ...