{
  "id": 18334587,
  "title": "Tobacco company got smoked by leaving secret recipes on a file share",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/11/05/tobacco-company-got-smoked-by-leaving-secret-recipes-on-a-file-share",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-11-05T16:02:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "The Register Science",
    "slug": "the-register-science",
    "url": "https://www.theregister.com/security/2026/11/05/tobacco-company-got-smoked-by-leaving-secret-recipes-on-a-file-share/5307704"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "In an unusual security discovery, a tobacco company found itself the victim of its own poor data management practices. Professional pen tester Dahvid Schloss, tasked with identifying vulnerabilities in the company's network, stumbled upon highly sensitive trade secrets. Schloss used Metasploit, a popular open-source pen testing application, to probe the network. Surprisingly, the company's Trend Micro antivirus failed to issue any alerts during the scanning process. Schloss compared the lack of alert to shooting a machine gun without anyone hearing it, expressing the company's apparent lack of concern for their security.\n\nUpon further investigation, Schloss found that the company's Trend Micro antivirus was not alerting him to any vulnerabilities as he scanned the network. Feeling undervalued, Schloss consulted his manager, who suggested focusing on what was important to the organization. Schloss reasoned that the recipes could be a valuable target for hackers and began searching for network file shares, specifically looking for unauthenticated or anonymous access. He discovered an open file share and used Nmap to scan the system, revealing open ports 139 and 445. These ports indicated that the system was running the Windows SMB file sharing protocol.\n\nDespite the presence of sensitive IT and HR records, this file share contained no access restrictions and was freely accessible to every employee. Schloss discovered a folder named \"confidential\" and within it, files named with the product name and date. He opened one of these files, which contained detailed information about the manufacturing process, including the weight, volume, and percentage of chemicals. This file was marked as \"Confidential\" and \"Do not share\" at the top and bottom, respectively. Schloss downloaded the file, intending to demonstrate to the company the existence of these sensitive documents. However, his manager requested that he delete the downloaded file, as it was deemed too sensitive to retain a copy.\n\nFollowing his initial findings, Schloss reported his discovery to the company's security team, expecting them to address the issue. To his surprise, he returned the next morning to find that the company had denied the existence of the recipes and the security problem altogether. This dispute dragged on for a year, with Schloss unable to prove the existence of the files as they had been deleted or moved. Despite the deletion, Schloss confirmed that the files had once existed by rechecking towards the end of the engagement. The company's denial of the recipe files raises questions about their data security and management practices.",
  "summary": "They denied the data was real...then removed it",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}