The database was not protected by a password and the leaked phone numbers could have been used to make spam calls. Even worse, with a phone number that belongs to a wireless carrier, a bad actor could change the password and address of an unsuspecting victim’s wireless account. That could allow the hacker to order some expensive phones, have them shipped to his address and leave the victim holding the bag. The leak was discovered by security researcher Sanyam Jain, who said that the database included the phone number of several celebrities.

Facebook, as you might imagine, played down the leak with a spokesperson stating that there is no evidence that Facebook accounts were compromised. The spokesperson did say that the information had been data scraped before Facebook last year eliminated access to members’ phone numbers. Once TechCrunch spoke to the database’s web host, the data was taken offline. It also was able to confirm the legitimacy of some of the leaked phone numbers.,