A data exposure linked to a major Middle Eastern finance gathering has raised fresh concerns over cybersecurity governance at high-profile global events. Sensitive identity documents belonging to prominent international figures were left accessible online following an apparent storage vulnerability connected to the Abu Dhabi Finance Week.
According to the Financial Times, scans of more than 700 passports and state identity cards were discovered on an unsecured cloud storage server associated with Abu Dhabi Finance Week, a state-sponsored event that drew more than 35,000 attendees in December. Among those affected were former British Prime Minister David Cameron, hedge fund billionaire Alan Howard and US investor Anthony Scaramucci. The documents were reportedly accessible through a standard web browser, having been stored without adequate protection.
The vulnerability was identified by freelance security researcher Roni Suchowski, who alerted the Financial Times. The publication reported that the server was secured after it approached organisers regarding the issue. The exposed files were linked to a third-party vendor-managed storage environment related to a limited subset of attendees for the 2025 edition of the event.
In a statement to Reuters, Abu Dhabi Finance Week said the environment was secured immediately upon identification and that an initial review indicated access activity was limited to the researcher who discovered the issue. Alan Howard declined to comment, while Cameron and Scaramucci did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The incident highlights the operational risks associated with large-scale international conferences that process extensive personal documentation for accreditation and security purposes. While organisers indicated that exposure appeared limited, the scale of the leaked identification documents underscores the vulnerabilities inherent in outsourced digital infrastructure and third-party data management arrangements, particularly where global political and financial figures are involved.
