Facebook data on more than 3 million people who took a personality quiz was published onto a poorly protected website where it could have been accessed by unauthorized parties, according to New Scientist. In a report exposing the potential leak, New Scientist says that the data contained Facebook users’ answers to a personality trait test. While it didn’t include users’ names, in many cases it contained their age, gender, and relationship status. For 150, 000 people, it even contained their status updates.
All that data was supposed to be accessible only to approved researchers through a collaborative website. However, New Scientist found that a username and password that granted access to the data could be found “in less than a minute” with an online search, enabling anyone to download the trove of personal information.
Source: The Verge