Users of the Guardian ’ s Soulmates dating site have been getting spammed with smut after the site leaked Attack.Databreach their contact information . The UK-based Guardian newspaper ’ s publisher , which runs the service , is blaming “ human error ” and a third-party technology provider for the leak , which has now been fixed . According to the BBC , the site — which charges users up to £32 ( $ 41.50 ) per month — said that only email addresses and user IDs had been exposed Attack.Databreach directly . But that information can be used to dig out more from public profiles , said the company , including photos , relationship preferences and physical descriptions . Here ’ s a statement the publisher sent to The Register : We can confirm we have received 27 enquiries from our members which show evidence of their email addresses used for their Soulmates account having been exposed Attack.Databreach . We take matters of data security extremely seriously and have conducted thorough audits of all our internal systems and are confident that no outside party breached any of these systems . Our ongoing investigations point to a human error by one of our third party technology providers , which led to an exposure Attack.Databreach of an extract Attack.Databreach of data . This extract Attack.Databreach contained only members ’ email addresses and user ID which can be used to find members ’ publicly available online profiles . We have taken appropriate measures to ensure this does not happen again , and we continue to review our processes and third party suppliers . Nonetheless , we apologise to our members who were affected . If any of our members are concerned we encourage them to contact us on support @ guardiansoulmates.com . One user who contacted the BBC said they ’ d starting receiving sexually explicit spam , laced with information from their Soulmates profile , in November . The user , who works in IT , said they weren ’ t completely surprised . Things like this can happen with online services . But they were still a bit taken aback , given that they hadn ’ t used the site for several years and they were no longer paying the membership fee . That user told the BBC that they had contacted Soulmates six months ago , concerned about what other information might have been breached Attack.Databreach . Another user who reached out to the BBC said that in spite of the breached information being public , it still felt “ creepy ” to see it lifted from the confines of the dating site : It ’ s all information that I was happy to put online at one point anyway , but when it ’ s used outside of context like that it does feel a lot more creepy . We don ’ t have details on the identity of the third-party tech provider , or where , exactly , in the setup the door was left open . At any rate , if it is indeed the fault of a third party , this is just the latest example of how contractors can be the weak link in your security chain . It doesn ’ t matter how strict your own cybersecurity is if one of your contractors isn ’ t up to scratch . As we ’ ve noted before , everyone we do business with , share data with , outsource operations to , sell things to or buy things from forms a part of our own security chain . A breach at any point in the chain can have an impact on the privacy and integrity of our data . As for those Soulmates users now afflicted with sexually explicit spam , our sympathies . It ’ s hard enough to find true love . Who needs the heartache of trying , and failing , to keep your data out of the hands of e-jerks ? We ’ ve passed out plenty of advice to avoid online dating fraud , but none of that applies here , given that you ’ re certainly not at fault in this one . Do be careful of that spam , though . Be it lascivious or as pure as a spring lamb , it ’ s still spam , and that stuff often goes hand in hand with malware . Don ’ t click !