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Microsoft Yanks Docs.com Search After Complaints of Exposed Sensitive Files (zdnet.com)
Microsoft has quietly removed a feature on its document sharing site Docs.com that allowed anyone to search through millions of files for sensitive and personal information. From a report on ZDNet: Users had complained over the weekend on Twitter that anyone could use the site's search box to trawl through publicly-accessible documents and files stored on the site, which were clearly meant to remain private. Among the files reviewed by ZDNet, and seen by others who tweeted about them, included password lists, job acceptance letters, investment portfolios, divorce settlement agreements, and credit card statements -- some of which contained Social Security and driving license numbers, dates of birth, phone numbers, and email and postal addresses. The company removed the site's search feature late on Saturday, but others observed that the files were still cached in Google's search results, as well as Microsoft's own search engine, Bing.
Well, your information, not ours.
FTFA (and a major WTF)
All of the documents would have been uploaded by their owners, but they may not have realized that each document could be made public, which is Docs.com's default uploading setting, compared to files created or edited with Word and Excel Online, which are private until set otherwise.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I don't know why people use the cloud to store sensitive documents. It just doesn't seem like a smart thing to do.
Now I can Bing those secret files!
Haha, jk, no one uses Bing.
The homepage of Docs.com states ...
-Tap below to upload your documents.
-Later, you can choose who may view your documents.
How much later is anyone's guess.
Q: What is Bing?
A: The sound a MS service makes when it crashes.
Any Windows user knows it.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Never heard of Docs.com, but come on, uploading documents to Microsoft (or worse, Google)? You know some algorithm is looking at them even if some random human cant access them.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
The website says it's to share documentspublicly.
When you upload a document a large tile says that the Document will be shared with the Public, and you must change that setting to make it private.
When you click Save you are warned that your settings have Public selected.
This is the fault of the people that are ignoring the fact Microsoft has told them multiple times the document they are uploading will be public. This is NOT Microsoft's fault, it's the fault of the illiterate and ignorant.
Stuff you marked as world accessible is world accessible.
Microsoft = Job Security. I wouldn't have 20+ year old technical career without Microsoft. I don't expect that to change in the next 20+ years.
If anyone can pop into the search without even so much as logging in to a pseudo-vetted account like google/fb/linkedin or similar, you might as well just put the information in a telephone book and send it out to everyone because that's essentially what you've done.
Now, there's nothing 'wrong' with that unless the end user has some sort of general expectation of privacy or security. So the question becomes, did MS docs give that illusion to users? How or how not, specifically?
this is tacked onto the bottom of the linked article:
Update on March 27: the search feature has been added back, and is still exposing personal information. Microsoft hasn't explained why it reintroduced the feature again.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Shitting all over your privacy. And no one cares.
Update on March 27: the search feature has been added back, and is still exposing personal information. Microsoft hasn't explained why it reintroduced the feature again.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The whole point of the site is that you are putting documents there to be seen by everyone, sort of a YouTube for documents. It is a place to "Showcase and discover Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Sway, Minecraft world and PDF documents for free". Showcase being the key work, hey everyone in the world, look at my pretty documents.
I don't think this (for once) in a MS problem.
Modern app appers know that only apps can app apps, so only LUDDITES want to use the LUDDITE private setting! Modern app appers use the "appy" setting!
Apps!
The *actual* dictionary definition of "bing" is "a heap or pile". So my question to Microsoft is this "your search engine is a heaping pile of WHAT, exactly?"
"yanks", "exposed", and "sensitive"?
Slashdot: too hot for prime time.
Bing? Bong!
It's a feature.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
As a user of Docs.com, I'm not sure how users would realize that the site isn't public by default... It warns you in big banners that it's a public docs site for publishing product manuals or other public consumption items that aren't websites but you want to provide links to or where folks can search for it. You can limit it down for personal, but that if you wanted that, you'd use one of the many other services on the exact same menu like OneDrive or SharePoint.
Store everything locally.
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