Data of 243 Million Brazilians Exposed Online via Website Source Code

The personal information of more than 243 million Brazilians, including alive and deceased, has been exposed online after web developers left the password for a crucial government database inside the source code of an official Brazilian Ministry of Health's website for at least six months. From a report: The security snafu was discovered by reporters from Brazilian newspaper Estadao, the same newspaper that last week discovered that a Sao Paolo hospital leaked personal and health information for more than 16 million Brazilian COVID-19 patients after an employee uploaded a spreadsheet with usernames, passwords, and access keys to sensitive government systems on GitHub. Estadao reporters said they were inspired by a report filed in June by Brazilian NGO Open Knowledge Brasil (OKBR), which, at the time, reported that a similar government website also left exposed login information for another government database in the site's source code. Since a website's source code can be accessed and reviewed by anyone pressing F12 inside their browser, Estadao reporters searched for similar issues in other government sites.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.