Misconfigured Microsoft Endpoint exposed B2B customer data

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Security researchers at SOCRadar informed Microsoft about a misconfigured data bucket that exposed 2.4 Terabytes of data to the public. The data includes sensitive information, including personally identifiable information, product orders and offers, project details, or statement of work documents, according to SOCRadar.
 


Microsoft protected the endpoint hours after being informed about it by the company. The data includes files dated from 2017 to August 2022. SOCRadar notes that the data includes information about more than 65,000 companies from 111 countries.

The company has created a search option on their website. A free account is required to search the data and find out if a particular company is affected.

Microsoft confirmed the data exposure issue on October 19th, 2022. According to Microsoft, it found no indication that customer accounts or systems were compromised. The misconfiguration had the potential that data was accessed by unauthorized entities.

The data that was accessible includes "names, email addresses, email content, company name, and phone numbers" according to Microsoft. Attached files, relating to "business between a customer and Microsoft or an authorized Microsoft partner" may also have been included. SOCRadar claims that the data includes sensitive information, including signed customer documents, customer assets documents, product price lists and more.

Impacted customers were notified by Microsoft, according to the statement.

A large part of the announcement on Microsoft's website is used to criticize SOCRadar and its handling of the incident. Microsoft claims that SOCRadar has "greatly exaggerated the scope" of the issue, stating that the data set includes duplicate information.

Microsoft expressed disappointment that SOCRadar released a public search tool, as it may expose customers to "unnecessary risk". SOCRadar should have implemented a system that is using verification to ensure that data is revealed only to users affected by the leak and that information is only displayed to the actual user.

Closing Words

Fact is, customer data was stored on an unprotected endpoint for a period of time. It is unclear if SOCRadar was the only entity that downloaded the data; Microsoft claims that it could not detect unauthorized access to the data.

Whether SOCRadar is overplaying the importance of the exposed endpoint and the data it contained, or Microsoft is trying to downplay the issue is difficult to say at this endpoint. Microsoft is obviously interested in protecting customer data, its reputation as a cloud security provider, and constraining the potential leak, SOCRadar in furthering its business through publicy.

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