Millions of people's info stolen from MGM Resorts dumped on Telegram for free

Miscreants have dumped on Telegram more than 142 million customer records stolen from MGM Resorts, exposing names, postal and email addresses, phone numbers, and dates of birth for any would-be identity thief. The vpnMentor research team stumbled upon the files, which totaled 8.7 GB of data, on the messaging platform earlier …

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet again

I have two identity protection services as settlements for two different breaches years ago. From their scans, at this point, everything needed for a phishing attack is available for purchase or free.

Stories like this are interesting to me only to see who got hit this time.

While I assume everybody reading this takes appropriate precautions, the masses have yet to be convinced that they need to change their behavior.

This isn't the old internet (if it ever was).

[MiguelC]

Re: "the masses have yet to be convinced that they need to change their behavior."

How come? Don't use hotels? After getting your PPI miscreants may not even need anything else to con someone into believing they're really talking to you.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "the masses have yet to be convinced that they need to change their behavior."

I would classify hotel clerks as part of the masses. As are most of the people on the planet.

My point is that phishing is now a ubiquitous fact of life. It isn't going away. Recipients of phishing calls, texts, emails, even snail mails need to have zero trust in them and change the way they deal with them.

[Trigonoceps occipitalis]

Re: "the masses have yet to be convinced that they need to change their behavior."

"Recipients of phishing calls ... "

And thereby hangs the problem. How do they tell it is phishing and not legit? I know we know. All we can do is try to educate the non-cognoscenti.

[Rustbucket]

DOB?

Why the hell do you need date of birth to check into an hotel or resort?

[Clausewitz4.0]

Re: DOB?

Most likely to prove you are not underage, avoid legal problems in the future to the hotel / resort.

[John69]

Re: DOB?

You do not need to store the DOB for that. When presented with a DOB. you check if it was more than 18 years ago. If it was, you record a boolean that it was.

[DJO]

Re: DOB?

For repeat customers I suppose so they don't have to keep asking. Storing just the year would be adequate, they'd only have to keep asking for one year then.

Also I think the legal drinking age may vary by jurisdiction.

But the data should've been encrypted at the very least. No excuses.

[cantankerous swineherd]

internet birthday + internet phone number mitigates some of these problems

[MiguelC]

Unless they try to phone you to confirm your reservation.... I get that with restaurants you must book with, sometimes, weeks in advance

[yetanotheraoc]

If you don't want to see insects, don't look under that rock

"... and didn't tell anyone it was using that information for targeted advertising ..."

News flash: All information gathered for any purpose will be used for targeted advertising. If caught and if fined, they will simply pay up, and find a sneakier way to do the exact same thing again.