"Backup Error Exposes 1.37 Billion-Record Spamming Database"

Security researchers at anti-virus company, MacKeeper, have discovered backup databases that hold about 1.37 million records of names, IP addresses, zip codes, and other personal addresses. These databases were left exposed by marketing company, River City Media, due to the lack of proper authentication measures. This article discusses how RCM may have collected this data, possible spamming techniques performed, as well as the massive impact a leakage of this data could have.

http://www.govinfosecurity.com/backup-error-exposes-137-billion-record-spamming-database-a-9755

[dusko's comment:] The nice thing about security is that when something looks like a fish, and smells like a fish, and sounds like a fish, then it usually isn't a fish. The "anti-virus company MacKeeper" is known to many Mac users as coming very close to ransomware: they begin with a popup claiming that your computer is infected and that you have to pay them to clean it, and then they reconfigure the kernel, serve adware, and ask additional payments for updates. They were a target of 2 class action suits that argued that that their software was malware. They settled one class action in 2015, and I am not sure what happened with the other one. In 2016, someone called Chris Vickery found an unsecured online MacKeeper database with 13M private records:

http://www.databreachtoday.com/191-million-us-voter-registration-records-exposed-a-8772

Mr Vickery seem to be the researcher who now "works for the anti-virus company MacKeeper", and makes similar security announcements in their name.