Articles by Bob Diachenko

Blog, Data Breach, elasticsearch June 3, 2019

The University of Chicago Medicine Exposed ‘Perspective Givers’ Database With More Than A Million of Records

Elasticsearch misconfigurations and related data incidents have became top news recently, even after Elastic introduced free security packs for all their users. Nevertheless, we at SecurityDiscovery.com, are still registering 5-10 big cases every month and…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach, mongodb May 29, 2019

London-based Marketplace Accidentally Exposed Personal Details of its Customers

In another MongoDB-related misconfiguration incident, a UK-based company exposed personal and payment data of several hundreds of its customers. On May 21st, I have identified an open and unprotected MongoDB instance, with no password/login needed…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach, database, elasticsearch May 13, 2019

Panama Citizens Massive Data Breach

On May 10th I identified a massive bulk of data sitting in an unprotected and publicly available Elasticsearch cluster (hence visible in any browser). This database contained 3,427,396 records with detailed information on Panamanian citizens…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach, mongodb May 9, 2019

Massive SMS Bombing Operation Uncovered In Passwordless Database

SMS marketing has been an increasing problem with the rise of scripts and applications and that send literally countless messages as fast as they can be sent. On April 11th, I discovered an open and…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach, database, mongodb May 8, 2019

Database With Millions of Indian Personal Records Exposed and Hijacked

On May 1st, I have discovered an unprotected and publicly indexed MongoDB database which contained 275,265,298 records with personal identifiable information (PII) on Indian citizens, including the following fields: Name Email Gender Education level and area…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach, elasticsearch May 7, 2019

Burger King’s Online Shop for Kids Exposed Data

Kool King Shop, (https://www.koolkingshop.fr/), a French-only online shop for kids who purchased Burger King’s menus, had customers data exposed in a misconfigured database. An open and unprotected Elasticsearch cluster with plain-text data was left unattended…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach, database, mongodb May 3, 2019

AMC inadvertently exposed its subscribers database for Sundance Now and Shudder services

On May 1st I have discovered an unprotected and publicly available MongoDB instance which appeared to contain data related to AMC Networks’ premium streaming offerings – Sundance NOW and Shudder. Although no sensitive information was…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach, database, mongodb April 18, 2019

Iranian Ride-Hailing App Database Exposure

On April 18th, during our regular security audit of nonSql databases with BinaryEdge search engine, I have discovered an open and publicly available MongoDB instance which contained astonishingly sensitive information on Iranian drivers. Information was…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, database, elasticsearch, spammers April 2, 2019

Massive Spam Operation Uncovered In A Database Leak

Sometimes databases are left wide open not only by legit companies, but misconfigured by malicious actors themselves. Last month I have discovered a publicly available database with almost 5GB of 11,535,164 records with compromised emails…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach April 1, 2019

Large Privacy Breach In India: Millions of Pregnant Women Had Their Details Leaked

Medical data is among the most sensitive information that organizations can collect, store, or share. It is never a good idea to store medical data in plain text or leave it publicly accessible. The nightmare…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog March 25, 2019

Auchan France Left Digital Keys Exposed

On March 21, 2019, I have discovered a publicly available service instance which appeared to contain credentials and login details to Auchan E-Commerce infrastructure. IP with Marathon and Zookeeper instances was indexed by public search…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach March 20, 2019

Spanish Gym Franchise Database Exposed By Partner’s Data Breach

On March 8th, 2019, I have identified a passwordless MongoDB database that was exposing sensitive information of an estimated 6,608 VivaGym job candidates and other business related data. VivaGym is a Spanish low-cost gym franchise…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach March 15, 2019

A legal analytics company exposed passwordless database with sensitive documents

On March 2nd, 2019, I have discovered an open and unprotected Elasticsearch cluster which contained 257,287 legal documents labeled as ‘not designated for publication‘. The research was part of our initiative to identify and alert organizations…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach March 7, 2019

800+ Million Emails Leaked Online by Email Verification Service

On February 25th, 2019, I discovered a non-password protected 150GB-sized MongoDB instance. This is perhaps the biggest and most comprehensive email database I have ever reported. Upon verification I was shocked at the massive number…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach, world February 27, 2019

Dow Jones Risk Screening Watchlist Exposed Publicly in a Major Data Breach

On Feb 22 2019, I found a copy of the Dow Jones Watchlist dataset, sitting on a public Elasticsearch cluster 4.4GB in size and available for public access to anyone who knew where to look…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach February 21, 2019

Delhi Citizens Data Leak

On Feb 19, 2019, I have discovered a MongoDB that required no password. The database was located in an India region which (along with other data) also contained highly sensitive information collected on 458,388 individuals…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach February 11, 2019

Large eAccounting Data Breach in Mexico

On January 22, 2019, we have identified a passwordless MongoDB database with almost 5 Million records labeled as CFDI (short for Comprobantes Fiscal Digital por Internet) – the electronic billing schema defined by the Mexican federal tax…

Like this story? Please share it!

Data Breach January 24, 2019

A LatAm telecom company inadvertently exposed payment info of its subscribers

On Nov 29th 2018 I have identified an unprotected Elasticsearch cluster, available for public access, via Shodan engine. It took me some time before I analyzed the data and noted that almost all payment information…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach January 23, 2019

Document Management Company Left Credit Reports Online

On January 10th, I identified an unprotected Elasticsearch cluster which contained 51 GB of what appeared to be OCR (Optical character recognition) credit and mortgages reports, with total number of records in the database more…

Like this story? Please share it!

Blog, Data Breach January 21, 2019

The World’s Largest Youth-Run Organization Had a Data Breach

On January 11th, Bob Diachenko of SecurityDiscovery.com, identified another unprotected Elasticsearch instance which contained millions of records – this time related to AIESEC, “the world’s largest youth-run organization. According to Wikipedia the AIESEC network has…

Like this story? Please share it!