14 DAY TRIAL // This is the first article in the 'security news' category this week and? it's bad news. Some hackers strive really hard to get a load of sensitive data, but sometimes, they don't need to. Some users offer sensitive data on a silver platter, just because they're negligent. Here's how things stand - an ex-employee of the ABN Amro Mortgage group installed BearShare on her machine, to get some files from the web. However, as you know, if you use this type of programs, to be able to download files you have to upload some as well. This is only a fair deal that is meant to kill leachers (users who only download).
So, what this employee had to do was to make some files available for download. That's when she decided to share a large part of her hard-drive with the rest of the network. It would have only been her problem what she shared and what not, if it hadn't been for the huge pile of secret info she had on her hard-drive. So, basically, she shared a lot of ABN Amro customer data. This is like gold for people interested in identity theft. More than 5.000 people have been affected by this and this is not the first time when such 'happenings' occur. The info included names, mortgage details, which in my opinion are enough details to launch a spam-scam campaign.
Some malicious users just use these share programs to search for personal data that careless people share. It's one of the easiest ways to phish. These P2P systems will allow you to share anything you like - if you want to share your win32 folder, then you can. These programs are pretty bad for some - it's enough that some users don't mind enough about cyber-security, but this type of software just "helps" them become even more insecure. A little bit of attention can help a lot when it comes to security.