Verified By BOOM
Posts
Verified By BOOM | 119

Verified By BOOM | 119

Who Exposed Data Of 3 Crore Star Health Customers?

October 11, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes

Browser View | October 12, 2024 | Subscribe

Hello,

Star Health and Allied Insurance Co. Ltd. confirmed it was the victim of a malicious cyberattack, compromising data of over 31 million customers. Who exposed it? Read on to find out!

It was World Mental Health Day on Thursday, 10 October. As soon as news breaks, the internet is usually flooded with misinformation around the incident. This means fact-checkers and digital investigators have to watch more visuals (not once or twice but multiple times), spend more time investigating, more exposure to gory and graphic content.

This can be overwhelming. For anyone.

Here are some tips that can help you maintain mental hygiene:

Trigger warning: At BOOM, whenever we share any graphic content with the team, we remove the ‘preview’ of that URL and always add a trigger warning along with the message so that everyone has a heads up before they view it.
Blur extension: This is a Chrome browser extension that blurs all images on a page, for when you want to be discreet or don't want to look at certain images. You can choose to view or not view content. Read here to learn how to use it.
Go monochrome: If a visual is too gory to watch, convert them into black and white.
Audio, necessary?: While watching a video, if only the footage has to be analysed, it’s a good idea to mute the audio or remove it.
It’s okay to switch off: Take breaks! Easier said than done but it’s fine to take a break, read something or take a walk and then continue investigating. Mental health >>> anything else.

Subscribe to Decode with Adrija, a fortnightly newsletter for the weird, wonderful, and worrying corners of the Internet. From misinformation and scams to AI's impact, expect insights, stories, and discoveries from the digital world!

Hibox: How Influencer-Promoted Mystery Box App Turned Into A Money Trap

🔖 Hype and promise: Lucky Jaiswal, a student from Jaipur, was scrolling through YouTube when he stumbled upon something intriguing. Popular influencers like Elvish Yadav and Abhishek Malhan, known as Fukra Insaan, were raving about an app called Hibox. The promise? Mystery boxes containing items worth up to Rs 1,00,000, all guaranteed to be "100% authentic." Intrigued, Jaiswal decided to try out the app.

The hook: "The platform promised that you could successfully resell your items within 24 hours, giving users a chance to recover their money or even make a profit beyond their initial investment," Jaiswal told Hera Rizwan. This created an illusion of risk-free profit.

The problem: While he initially managed to earn good money, eventually he could not withdraw that money which reflected in his digital wallet. This amount was to the tune of Rs 50,000.

He wasn’t alone. Across India, thousands were drawn into Hibox's allure. The app, launched in July 2023, exploded in popularity, amassing over half a million downloads on Google Play Store in just three months.

Explained: Who Exposed Data Of 3 Crore Star Health Customers?

🔖 Data breach: Star Health and Allied Insurance Co. Ltd., on Wednesday, announced that it had been the target of a malicious cyberattack, leading to unauthorised and illegal access to certain data, according to an official statement.

Hacker says: “I am leaking all Star Health India customers and insurance claims sensitive data. This leak is sponsored by Star Health and Allied Insurance Company, which sold this data to me directly. You can check the authenticity of the data in the Telegram bots below and read about how they sold it in the section below,” the hacker reportedly mentioned on a website, set up by the hacker going by the name xenZen. It claims to possess data on exactly 31,216,953 customers.

So, what exactly has been leaked and how has Star Health responded? Find out in Hera Rizwan’s explainer.

Why Are Experts Concerned About Airtel's New AI Spam Tool?

🔖 Newly launched: Airtel has recently launched an AI-powered spam detection tool aimed at protecting users from unwanted calls and messages.

The concern: While the tool promises enhanced security and a more streamlined communication experience, experts have expressed concerns over potential privacy implications.

Expert’s take: Technology advocate Utkarsh Kumar told Hera Rizwan that although Airtel claims it does not monitor the content of calls, it does track call data records. This includes the collection of personal information, such as call frequency, duration, and the ratio of incoming to outgoing calls. "However, Airtel has not provided strong safeguards or independent audits to ensure that this does not lead to profiling users into different categories. This poses a significant privacy risk, especially since Airtel is a private entity and not subject to the transparency standards required of public institutions," he stated.

🚫 Fake News You Almost Fell For

🔍 Viral claims circulating on social media about India being granted permanent membership in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) with veto power are false. Read 🔗 Nidhi Jacob’s ↗️ fact-check to find out more.

🔍 A video showing Palestine's Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki addressing the media was shared online with the false claim that he is briefing the media on the International Court of Justice declaring Israel as an illegal state 🔗 Archis Chowdhury ↗️ debunked the claim.

🔍 A prank video from an Iraq TV show where an actor disguised as an Islamic priest gets slapped by a female actress for making abusive comments against her was shared with a false and communal claim adding that it is a real incident from Lebanon. 🔗 Nivedita Niranjankumar ↗️ found out the truth.

🅱️ Recommends

📖 This week's recommendation is: Inside the funhouse mirror factory: How social media distorts perceptions of norms

Read Here

↪️ Was this forwarded to you? Subscribe Now

Verified By Boom is written by Divya Chandra, edited by Adrija Bose

and designed by H Shiva Roy Chowdhury.

If you have suggestions about this newsletter or want us to conduct workshops on specific topics, drop us a line at 👉 [email protected] and we will get back to you in a jiffy. Thanks for reading. See you next week.👋

🖤 Liked what you read? Give us a shoutout! 📢

↪️ Become A BOOM Member. Support Us!↪️ Stop.Verify.Share - Use Our Tipline: 7700906588↪️ Join Our Community of TruthSeekers