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23andMe tells victims it's their fault that their data was breached | TechCrunch (techcrunch.com)

submitted 10 months ago by Eezyville@sh.itjust.works to c/technology@lemmy.world

234 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hope this isn't a repeated submission. Funny how they're trying to deflect blame after they tried to change the EULA post breach.

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[–] EndOfLine@lemmy.world 33 points 10 months ago (4 children)

23andMe admitted that hackers had stolen the genetic and ancestry data of 6.9 million users

I'm honestly asking what the impact to the users is from this breach. Wasn't 23andMe already free to selling or distribute this data to anybody they wanted to, without notifying the users?

[–] hoshikarakitaridia@sh.itjust.works 32 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

That's not how this works. They are running internationally, and GDPR would hit them like a brick if they did that.

I would assume they had some deals with law enforcement to transmit data one narrow circumstances.

I'm honestly asking what the impact to the users is from this breach.

Well if you signed up there and did an ancestry inquiry, those hackers can now without a doubt link you to your ancestry. They might be able to doxx famous people and in the wrong hands this could lead to stalking, and even more dangerous situations. Basically everyone who is signed up there has lost their privacy and has their sensitive data at the mercy of a criminal.

This is different. This is a breach and if you have a company taking care of such sensitive data, it's your job to do the best you can to protect it. If they really do blame this on the users, they are in for a class action and hefty fine from the EU, especially now that they've established even more guidelines towards companies regarding the maintenance of sensitive data. This will hurt on some regard.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 16 points 10 months ago (2 children)

If they really do blame this on the users

It's not that they said:

It's your fault your data leaked

What they said was (paraphrasing):

A list of compromised emails/passwords from another site leaked, and people found some of those worked on 23andme. If a DNA relative that you volunteered to share information with was one of those people, then the info you volunteered to share was compromised to a 3rd party.

Which, honestly?

Completely valid. The only way to stop this would be for 23andme to monitor these "hack lists" and notify any email that also has an account on their website.

Side note:

Any tech company can provide info if asked by the police. The good ones require a warrant first, but as data owners they can provide it without a warrant.

[–] LUHG_HANI@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago

That's not 23 and me fault at all then. Basically boils down to password reuse. All i would say is they should have provided 2fa if they didn't.

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