'Stupid' administrators left Davos open to hack attack

The attack - for which a suspect has been arrested - was apparently made easy by lax security and carelessness on the part of the organisers. The hacker copied private data about the Forum's participants onto a CD-ROM, which was sent to the media who verified the hack as genuine.

However, according to German newspaper Schweizer Wochenzeitung almost anybody could have gained access to the system.

Using a port scan, the culprit found an open port in the system. Having done so, password protection threw up no obstacle for the hacker as the default password - supplied with every Microsoft database - was still being used.

Rüdiger Dierstein, former security expert for DLR, said: "The whole thing is unbelievable. It's more than sloppiness, it's blatant stupidity. The person responsible should have been dismissed immediately."

By Irene Binal, reporter, silicon.de