Personal data of 1.3million Brits was left at the mercy of hackers and ... trends now
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A digital neighbourhood watch scheme used by 33 police forces left the personal data of up to 1.3million people at the mercy of hackers and fraudsters, the Daily Mail can reveal.
The Action Fraud-backed Neighbourhood Alert system allows concerned citizens to message each other and receive bespoke updates about local crime.
But until last week, the platform's defective security permissions let anyone with an email address to sign up and see phone numbers, addresses, and in some cases photos belonging its users.
The design flaw allowed members to draw city-sized neighbourhood watch scheme boundaries on a map and obtain data on hundreds of thousands of signed-up 'suggested members' who live within the boundary.
Local fire and rescue departments, police and crime commissioners, and councils are also signed up to the network.
Digital neighbourhood watch Neighbourhood Alert (pictured) used by 33 police forces left the personal data of up to 1.3million people at the mercy of hackers and fraudsters
A design flaw allowed members to draw city-sized neighbourhood watch scheme boundaries on a map and obtain data on hundreds of thousands of signed-up 'suggested members' who live within the boundary
They all offer re-branded websites of the scheme, such as actionfraudalert.co.uk for Action Fraud, but all the data belongs of the Neighbourhood Alert database.
This means that while someone could have signed up through their local police force alert system in the north of England, they could still scour data pooled by a different scheme in the south of the country.
Among those whose name, phone number, and address was made public were MPs, civil
