If you pay traffic fines online, your data may have been leaked publicly
Sensitive personal information about nearly one-million people who pay traffic fines online in SA has been leaked publicly. The data leak of 934,000 records includes identity numbers‚ e-mail addresses‚ full names and passwords. After some detective work, Australian cyber security researcher Troy Hunt along with Tefo Mohapi from iAfrikan discovered that the "data was backed up or posted publicly by one of the companies responsible for traffic fines online payments in SA". The leak does not affect all licensed drivers; only those who have registered to pay traffic fines online using one or more of the sites that provide the service. People who have registered to pay traffic fines online were urged to change their passwords. "This is yet another reminder of how far our data can spread without our knowledge. In this case‚ in particular‚ the presence of plain-text [unencrypted] passwords poses a serious risk because inevitably‚ those passwords will unlock many of the other accounts that ...
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