A Massive U.S. Property and Demographic Database Exposes 200 Million Records

guest · Mar 5, 2020

A Massive U.S. Property and Demographic Database Exposes 200 Million Records
March 5, 2020
https://thehackernews.com/2020/03/us-property-records-database.html

More than 200 million records containing a wide range of property-related information on US residents were left exposed on a database that was accessible on the web without requiring any password or authentication.

The exposed data — a mix of personal and demographic details — included the name, address, email address, age, gender, ethnicity, employment, credit rating, investment preferences, income, net worth, and property information, [...]
According to security firm Comparitech, the database, which was hosted on Google Cloud, is said to have been first indexed by search engine BinaryEdge on 26th January and discovered a day later by cybersecurity researcher Bob Diachenko.

"We've been trying to contact Googles cloud security team (IP with database was hosted on their cloud) for them to take down the IP but never got a response," the research team told The Hacker News. "
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Spear-phishing Warning
Given that the data was not adequately secured, it's not immediately clear if other unauthorized parties accessed this database and downloaded its content. The consequence of such exposure is the increased possibility of targeted spear-phishing attacks.

"The detailed personal, demographic, and property information contained in this data-set is a gold mine for spammers, scammers, and cybercriminals who run phishing campaigns," Comparitech said. "The data allows criminals not only to target specific people but craft a more convincing message."
Specifically, attackers could target individuals with phishing emails to deliver all kinds of malware that can download malicious programs and steal sensitive information.
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Comparitech: US property and demographic database of 200 million records leaked on the web

More than 200 million records containing a wide range of property-related data on US residents were exposed on the web without a password.
Click to expand...

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