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Oh, This Is A Good Breach!


V.T. Eric Layton

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V.T. Eric Layton

Hmm, getting "Corrupted Content Error" at above link.

 

The link above was for a PCMag article. It's fixed now, I think.

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securitybreach

Hmm, getting "Corrupted Content Error" at above link.

 

The link above was for a PCMag article. It's fixed now, I think.

 

Cool, thanks :thumbup:

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Wow!

How long the database was exposed isn't known, but it contained detailed information on 230 million consumers, and another 110 million business contacts, Troia told PCMag.

 

Each record can list the subject's phone number, address, date of birth, estimated income, number of children, education level, credit rating and much more. According to Troia, the records are divided into dozens of different fields that can identify whether a person reads books, owns a dog or cat, or invests in real estate.

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abarbarian

340 million! I wonder how many of them agreed to be in the database?

 

At a guess non of them,

 

How it obtained so much sensitive information isn't clear. But Exactis is merely one of several data-mining firms that excel at collecting people's personal data for marketing purposes. Other providers such as Acxiom can collect the information by tapping into public records, using consumer surveys or buying it from commercial entities that have managed to gather the data with your own consent.

As creepy as this sounds, the data-mining is usually done legally. But clearly, hoarding all that sensitive data can also pose a massive security risk.

 

However it looks like the data was gathered legally so everyone in the data base must have given their permission somewhere along the line to someone. :breakfast:

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V.T. Eric Layton

340 million! I wonder how many of them agreed to be in the database?

 

My guess would be very few. However, as Erik says above, somewhere along the line all of them probably clicked on some Privacy Agreement button at some site somewhere, then those sites sold the data to this data scarfing warehouse in the article. It is what it is...

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