Many high on-line shops are exposing non-public buyer knowledge, placing each the enterprise, and their customers, susceptible to id theft (opens in new tab), extortion assaults, and different cybersecurity incidents, new analysis has claimed.

Analyzing greater than 2,000 on-line shops, Sansec discovered that 250, or roughly 12%, saved their backups in public folders that are simply accessible to anybody who is aware of the place to look. 

The backups, largely .ZIP, .SQL, and .TAR archives, contained delicate info, comparable to database passwords, secret administrator URLs, inside API keys, and personally identifiable buyer info. 

Expensive errors

Sansec says companies saved these backups public both in negligence or in error. 

On the similar time, cybercriminals are effectively conscious that companies typically make these errors, and are all the time on the prowl for contemporary victims. 

“On-line criminals are actively scanning for these backups, as they include passwords and different delicate info,” Sansec stated in its report. “Uncovered secrets and techniques have been used to achieve management of shops, extort retailers and intercept buyer funds.”

Trying to find uncovered backups is an automatic observe, BleepingComputer stated in its report. Attackers search for completely different combos of doable names, utilizing the positioning’s identify and public DNS knowledge, for instance “/db/staging-SITENAME.zip”. These scans are cheap and don’t harm the positioning’s efficiency, so hackers are free to conduct as many as they will. 

To sort out the menace, Sansec says, web site homeowners and IT groups ought to usually analyze their websites for databases uncovered in error and out of negligence. In case they discover such a database, resetting admin accounts and database passwords, and enabling MFA on all worker accounts instantly, is really helpful. 

What’s extra, IT groups can test the net server logs to see if anybody downloaded the backup. They’ll additionally test admin account logs to see if any third-party accessed them.

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Through: BleepingComputer (opens in new tab)