Romanian hacker GhostShell has leaked today a collection of database dumps, which he claims he obtained from 110 misconfigured MongoDB servers.
The hacker has told that, following his rough estimates, there are around 36 million user records included in the leaks, among which 3.6 million also contain passwords.
The hacker has announced the data leak on Twitter and posted a link to a PasteBin URL where users can find a statement regarding the reasons behind the hack, screenshots from all the hacked servers, and various links from where users can download the data. The download package is a 598 MB ZIP file, which decompresses to 5.6 GB of data, containing 110 folders named based on the hacked server's IP. Each of these folders contains a screenshot as proof of the hacker's access to the server, a text file with details about the hacked server, and the entire database dump.
Based on the nature of each company, these databases hold information such as real names, usernames, email addresses, passwords, gender, geolocation info, social media information, details about the user's smartphone model, browser information, API credentials, and even avatar images.
In his statements, GhostShell says that he only used simple scanners like Shodan to discover these databases. The hacker describes Project Vori Dazel, as he names his recent MongoDB hacking spree, as a public protest against poor security practices. GhostShell says that all the databases he accessed had no username or password for the root account and had a large number of open ports.
The hacker also told that he wanted the campaign's message to get through, and hopes companies take a smarter approach to server security. He also said that, if he had wanted, he could have gather a lot more data, because there were several other servers still open to external connections online.
GhostShell's message is consistent with his previous campaign, called Light Hacktivism, during which the hacker set out to find and expose vulnerabilities and poor security practices in order to have them corrected. Previously, the hacker also embarked on a more aggressive campaign called Dark Hacktivism. This time around, the hacker has a problem with companies that deploy MongoDB without properly securing them.
