After all, what use is an email address if you can’t email people?Īs for VirusTotal itself, submitted files can be shared and analysed via the security organisations tied to the scanning service. Someone genuinely determined to pull up a name or email address can usually do it by checking relevant websites or simply asking around. While there is some element of risk here, it’s important not to get carried away. This is of course good news, and much better than everyone running around yelling that the sky is falling. The UK’s Ministry of Defence told The Record that they consider the data to be non-sensitive, and also low risk. Commentary from some of the impacted organisations suggest this isn’t that big of a deal. The file was removed by VirusTotal within an hour of it being uploaded. There are full names tied to emails from the Ministry of Defence, Pensions Regulator, and the Cabinet Office, among others.

Sadly the emails listed are not entirely anonymous. Meanwhile, the UK tally includes “a dozen Ministry of Defence personnel”, and emails tied to CERT-UK/National Cyber Security Centre, a part of the UK’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). The Record cites individuals affiliated with the NSA, FBI, Pentagon, and other US military service branches. The list makes up roughly 5,600 of the site’s customers, and identities multiple security-centric entities. The service, used to scan files for signs of potential malicious activity, is used by security professionals and folks just interested in the files making their way to their systems. A document accidentally uploaded to Google’s VirusTotal service has resulted in the potential exposure of defence and intelligence agency names and email addresses.

360 total security malware removal