Honda Database Leaks 134M Rows of Employee Data

An exposed database at Honda allowed anyone to see which systems on its network were vulnerable to unpatched security flaws, potentially giving hackers insider knowledge of the company’s weak points.

The server contained 134 million rows of employee systems data from the company’s endpoint security service, containing technical details of each computer and device connected to the internal network. Affected by the White Hat probe were locations in Japan, USA, Mexico, and the UK.

Based on the Shodan scan of the IP in question, it appears that the database was likely publicly accessible as of July 1, 2019. Shodan is the world’s first search engine for Internet-connected devices.

In a statement Honda said: “The security issue you identified could have potentially allowed outside parties to access  some of Honda’s cloud-based data that consisted of information related to our employees and their computers. We investigated the system’s access logs and found no signs of data download by any third parties.

“At this moment, there is no evidence that data was  leaked, excluding the screenshots taken by you (Upstream). We will take appropriate actions in accordance with relevant laws and regulations and will continue to work on proactive security measures to prevent similar incidents in the future.”

Upstream said “Shodan yet again.” It uncovered an ElasticSearch database without any authentication. “The data contained within this database was related to the internal network and computers of Honda Motor Company. The information available in the database appeared to be something like an inventory of all Honda internal machines. This included information such as machine host name, MAC address, internal IP, operating system version, which patches had been applied, and the status of Honda’s endpoint security software.