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The Register exposes personal details of 47,000 readers
TECHNOLOGY NEWS web site The Register is red-faced this morning after it sent out an email to its readers containing the personal details of around 50,000 other users.
The web site has apologised to its readers in another email, in which it managed not to leak all of their email addresses, and explained to them that their details had been sent to 3,521 readers.
"This morning the name and email address you used to register for The Register was mistakenly sent to 3,521 individuals, also readers of The Register. We've contacted them asking them to delete the email and respect your privacy," it said, with remarkable faith in humanity.
"We are of course terribly sorry for this error and have reported ourselves to the ICO [Information Commissioner's Office]."
We have heard from some of these readers, and all of their comments could be kindly described as disappointed. Perhaps this is not surprising, given the scale of the error. In its news story on the "email blunder", the web site said that it had sent out the names and email addresses of 46,524 of its readers. Ouch.
Many Register readers have expressed their feelings - nay internet-comment-forum-style vitriol - at what happened in the comments beneath The Register's explanation. We would suggest that anyone who has a nervous disposition reads those comments from behind the sofa.
"It's already on Pastebin :( So I think they're pretty much NEVER going to live it down!", says one.
Others are much less kind, and ask the web site how it feels to be on the other end of the personal data breach finger pointing.
"Pretty freakin' poor show if you ask me. A company who goes to great pleasure in sneering at other organisations who commit the same mistake, then doesn't have the same tight controls it 'demands' of others is more than a bit hypocritical," says one angry reader.
"I wonder how long this data will take to appear on BitTorrent. You only need one person out of the 3,512 people to be a shit. And to be honest, that's quite likely," points out another.
The Register brushed the mistake off quite lightly, explaining that, "The two-stage send process that is the norm for all of our mailers was over-looked because someone was in a hurry."
We're just shocked that The Register had 50,000 readers. But maybe not for much longer. µ
Tags: Security
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At least you was honest enough to tell your own readers about.
Most places(companies) would not have told the readers and kept it quiet.
Hats off to you for informing us!!!
THANKS!!
Dont ever change one bit.
my junk email account will get more spam? I surely want notice. Only fools register with real names.
I wonder if The Inkwell has 50,000 members and what they will do when they blunder or get hacked?
Has The Inquirer settled the documented plagiarism cases brought against it yet?
It's nice to see that the Inq has acknowledged the Reg article from which it drew its information.
I still read the Inq. It's like an RSS feed of the other online news sources.
Wow, little bit of envy going on there? Don't kid yourselves on who's the Go-To IT news site, you guys threw that crown away years ago.
Inexcusable cock-up? Why yes, but one of the Register's ongoing themes is how difficult it is to keep all users doing everything right all the time. They also 'fessed up promptly. Would the Inq have tried to hide a similar event to save face?
Careful with the title: you're sounding like an iBoy already.
"Not a fan of with INQ or REG but their reporting quality is yours x 1000."
The Inquirer manages to be concise where it is necessary, which is frequently the case. It also manages to not repeatedly publish climate sceptic cheerleading dressed up as "I'm a scientist I am" nonsense.
So that 1000 is a bit off.
You guys remember how that works right, reporting the facts in an unbiased manner etc..
Not a fan of with INQ or REG but their reporting quality is yours x 1000.
Sort your game guys.
The Inquirer would take the higher ground rather than snipe a competitor, especially The Register, we all know the history between you two. I don't have to remind you of some of the inappropriate comments done by at least one of your reporters which have cause outrage in the community and forced the editor to post an apology?
I enjoy The Inquirer as a whole, but sometimes you border on being a bit Daily Mail-ish.
"We're just shocked that The Register had 50,000 readers. But maybe not for much longer. µ"
sounds like envy to me, what's happened to your readers? comments blocks seem to be empty on INQ - shit reporting could be blamed