Bing mobile app users on every platform – including iOS and iPadOS – are at risk after terabytes of user information have been stolen from an open server. Data related to the mobile app for iOS and Android has been found in an open server, which was storing over 6.5TB of data and growing by 200GB per day upon discovery. The white hat hacker group WizCase discovered the open server earlier in September, and promptly alerted Microsoft. The open server was secured by the Microsoft Security Response Center – but not before nearly 100 million records had been collected by bad-actors. Many types of hackers had access to the data while the server was open, so much or all of the data could have been collected.
This is an important reminder that humans can and will make mistakes. There is a fine line between reprimanding those at fault and understanding that mistakes do happen. However, companies must continually check for their inevitable vulnerabilities, and patch these at the earliest convenience.
Cyber criminals can do a lot of damage with a large breached list that simply contains names, emails, and other seemingly trivial data. Recent high profile breaches that have included many people\’s passwords are also readily available on the dark web, so it quickly becomes a simple exercise for cyber criminals to join the dots. As many people use the same passwords across multiple accounts, this risk is compounded and individuals are even more vulnerable. My advice is to use unique passwords for each account, and store them in a robust online password manager so you don’t have to remember them all. Implementing 2FA will also help mitigate this risk but remaining cautious and vigilant to threats can go a long way.