Microsoft Lets Users Know Their Data Was Leaked From the Cloud

From DailyTech: Microsoft's bid to move Office and its messaging software to the cloud hit a road bump this week when the company was forced to announce that it had accidentally share the private data of users of its Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) Standard suite.

BPOS is a messaging software used primarily by corporate users. Clint Patterson, director of BPOS Communications at Microsoft, admitted in an interview with Webwereld, a Dutch IDG publication, that some users have discovered a trick to access and download other users' contact lists.

He states, "We recently became aware that, due to a configuration issue, Offline Address Book information for Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS)--Standard customers could be inadvertently downloaded by other customers of the service, in a very specific circumstance."

The breach was widespread, with BPOS hosting in North America, Europe and Asia. Microsoft quickly spotted the suspicious activity and fixed the issue within two hours. However, "a very small number" of users downloaded other users' data illegitimately before the problem was fixed. Microsoft has reached out to those who appear to have illegitimately obtained other users data. States Mr. Patterson, "We are working with those few customers to remove the files."

The only thing fortunate about the situation for Microsoft and those involved is that the data lost wasn't terribly valuable -- it was merely a list of business contacts and did not contain personal information.

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