Greg's Corner

Data breach exposed most American families

This past week, a data breach was discovered that could have put the personal information of 80 million American families at risk. Internet security experts discovered an unprotected database that was hosted in the cloud included names, ages, and genders as well as income levels and marital status. What’s even more concerning is that it’s unknown who the database belongs to. It’s been theorized that it may belong to an insurance or mortgage company.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt-Mf8W-Zlg%5D

Every person in the database is said to be over the age of 40 which could potentially put seniors at risk not only for identity theft but phishing scams as well. There’s no evidence to suggest that cybercriminals accessed the database. However, the information could have been publicly accessible for months. Experts believe that the information provided in the database could also be used to launch ransomware attacks against people listed in the database.

The server that the database was stored on was a Microsoft cloud server but it’s up to the database’s owner to make sure the database is encrypted. Microsoft has contacted the owner of the database and it has since been removed from public access. With the number of data breaches becoming more frequent every day have we reached a point where we should just expect our data to become exposed?