Health data of 500,000 UK Biobank participants found for sale on Alibaba
By
dberhane
A bagel that needed a few more minutes. And maybe a fact-check.
Summary
Medical details of 500,000 UK Biobank participants were discovered for sale on the Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba. The leaked data includes sensitive health information such as gender, age, socioeconomic status, lifestyle habits, mental health, medical history, cognitive function, physical measurements, and lab results from haematology, biochemistry, metabolomic, and proteomic samples. UK Biobank found three listings on April 20, with at least one containing data from all 500,000 volunteers, along with listings offering application support.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledMedical details from 500 000 participants in the health data charity UK Biobank have been discovered for sale on the Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba.
Data for sale included people's gender, age, month and year of birth, socioeconomic status, lifestyle habits, mental health, self-reported medical history, cognitive function, and physical measures.
UK Biobank said that it had discovered three listings offering the data for sale on Monday 20 April, with at least one of these three datasets containing data from all 500 000 UK Biobank volunteers.
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