Aviation

Breach at SpiceJet affects 1.2 million passengers, says report

Updated : January 31, 2020 09:25 AM IST

The report said that a security researcher, who described their actions as 'ethical hacking', "gained access to one of SpiceJet’s systems by brute-forcing the system’s easily guessable password".

An unencrypted database backup file on that system had private information of more than 1.2 million passengers of the airline last month, the report added.

According to the report, each record included details such as the name of the passenger, phone number, email address and date of birth.

SpiceJet suffered a data breach involving the details of more than a million of its passengers, according to a report on TechCrunch.

The report said that a security researcher, who described their actions as 'ethical hacking', "gained access to one of SpiceJet’s systems by brute-forcing the system’s easily guessable password".

An unencrypted database backup file on that system had private information of more than 1.2 million passengers of the airline last month, the report added.

According to the report, each record included details such as the name of the passenger, phone number, email address and date of birth. "The database included a rolling month's worth of flight information and details of each commuter," the report said, citing the researcher, who added that the database was easily accessible for anyone who knew where to look.

The researcher alerted SpiceJet about the database but said they never received a meaningful response, added the reported. He later alerted CERT-In, a government-run agency in India that handles cyber-security threats in the nation. The agency confirmed the security lapse, and alerted SpiceJet, which has since taken the necessary measures to protect the database, it said.

“At SpiceJet, safety and security of our fliers’ data is sacrosanct. Our systems are fully capable and always up to date to secure the fliers’ data which is a continuous process. We undertake every possible measure to safeguard and protect this data and ensure that the privacy is maintained at the highest and safest level,” TechCrunch quoted an airline spokesperson.

Breach at SpiceJet affects 1.2 million passengers, says report

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