Oops: Soccer sponsor tweets England World Cup team’s passport numbers

An official FIFA document containing the details was shared with the media an hour before the British team played a match against Ecuador in Miami.

“Unfortunately England’s corporate sponsor Vauxhall clearly didn’t realise that the passport numbers might be sensitive, and excitedly tweeted out a smartphone photo of the line-up to ardent soccer fans,” ESET writes.

The snapshot showed the names, dates of birth, and passport numbers of England’s starting line-up of eleven players and the seven substitutes.

The tweet was quickly deleted.

This gaffe would be “bad enough for you or me – but imagine how much more tempting it might be for criminals to exploit the information when it relates to somebody who earns £125,000 per week,” ESET notes. “No doubt, however, most of those handsomely-paid players (on the English side at least, I have no idea what kind of salaries footballers command in Ecuador) will have a minion who can organise a new passport for them should it be felt to be required.”

ThreatWatch is a regularly updated catalog of data breaches successfully striking every sector of the globe, as reported by journalists, researchers and the victims themselves.