Was this able to be done programmatically? Like POST a set of numbers and get back their location data.
Wonder how long this was open for any bad actors to exploit.
Wonder how long this was open for any bad actors to exploit.
All I can say is wow.
I was going to poke around that site yesterday after I saw the article, because looking at their website it really looked like there had to be some vulnerabilities. What you tried is exactly the kind of thing I would have looked at first.
Yep, there’s no way you’re the first to find this. Honestly I’m at a loss for words how absurd this is. We just need to assume this was actively exploited for who knows how long.
We won't know what the real exposure level was unless someone asks LocationSmart very persuasively.
Your descriptions thus far are pretty vague but man... it sounds like there is a VERY high likelihood that this was being exploited by malicious actors on an ongoing basis.
I didn’t mean this to be offensive or crass. I was asking because generally security exploits are ranked by (a) severity and (b) triviality. That is, a severe bug that is extremely difficult to exploit is not as alarming as a severe bug that is trivial to exploit.
When laypeople read that a CMU researcher discovered a bug, they might assume it is not trivial. So in that sense mentioning the PhD almost does a disservice to expressing the triviality of the bug.
When a high school kid in Hungary discovered he could purchase train tickets for any price by changing it client side, non-technical people could understand it was a trivial bug. When a CMU researcher discovers a bug, they likely assume the opposite.