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Toyota Mishandled User Data by Publishing Over 2 Million User Info Online

Reports of data breaches resulting in the leakage of millions of user data are not uncommon. However, it is less common for a company to unintentionally publish millions of user data online.
Recently, Toyota Motor announced a cybersecurity case that involved its subsidiary, Toyota Connected, where part of the information about 2.15 million users was accidentally set online due to a setup error in the cloud service.

The leaked content includes vehicle serial numbers and location information, which were used for internal administrative purposes and cannot be traced back to the user.

The data breach covers orders for Toyota T-Connect, G-Link, G-Link Lite, and G-Link from Jan. 2, 2012, to April 17, 2023, affecting about 2.15 million users of the BOOK telematics service.

Dash cam footage uploaded to the cloud using an enterprise service provided by Toyota Connect from Nov. 14, 2016, to April 4, 2023, was also publicly accessible on the Internet.

The leaked data were all from Japan, comprising almost all users who had an active account with the company’s cloud service since 2012.

The spokesperson for Toyota confirmed that the data breach also affected users of its luxury brand Lexus, and there was a lack of active detection mechanisms and activities to detect the presence or absence of things that became public.

The system bug has been fixed, and there is no evidence that any data from the pool was used illegally.

Toyota claims to be working on a system to check its cloud settings, monitoring its settings often, and teaching staff how to handle users’ data.

There are also reports that the Personal Information Protection Commission is aware of the issue, but no official comment has been made since the commission does not comment on single issues.

Data breaches are not unique to Toyota; mobile service provider NTT DoCoMo reported in March that data of up to 5.29 million users may have been hacked by a company to which it had outsourced services.

It is essential for companies to take proactive measures to secure their customers’ data and prevent such breaches from occurring.

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