April 24, 2026
Add to Cart: Your Medical Life
UK Biobank leak: Health details of 500 000 people are offered for sale
From lab coats to Alibaba carts, commenters split: 'lock it down' vs 'open it up'
TLDR: UK Biobank data on 500,000 volunteers was reportedly listed for sale on Alibaba, including lab results and diagnosis dates. Commenters swing between privacy alarm, radical “publish it all” proposals with harsh penalties, jokes about who’s buying, and fury at paywalls—underscoring a deep trust crisis in health data.
Half a million Britons’ health data—everything from lifestyle habits and mental health to lab results and even cancer diagnosis dates—just showed up for sale on Alibaba, and the internet is losing it. UK Biobank says it found three listings, with at least one covering all 500,000 volunteers. The dataset reportedly spans gender, age, birth month/year, socioeconomic status, cognitive tests, and deep lab metrics (blood, biochemistry, metabolomics, proteomics), plus outcomes coded in ICD (the International Classification of Diseases).
Commenters split into camps. One camp is pure panic: “I want my DNA digitized…but who won’t leak it? 23andMe is right out,” sighs one user, capturing the trust collapse. Another throws a grenade: [londons_explore] argues there’s “no difference” between giving it to thousands of researchers and just posting it, proposing radical openness with life‑sentence penalties for misuse. Cynics crack that “the US government is first to buy,” while others note this isn’t the first leak, pointing to claims Biobank data “keeps ending up on GitHub” via this thread. And then, perfect irony: outrage at a paywall—“£50 to read the article”—with shots fired at the “scientific publishing cartel.” The vibe? Privacy funeral meets open‑data revolution, all happening in a bargain bin on a Chinese marketplace.
Key Points
- •UK Biobank discovered three listings on Alibaba offering data from its 500,000 volunteers.
- •At least one listing reportedly included data covering the entire UK Biobank cohort.
- •The data for sale encompassed demographics, socioeconomic status, lifestyle, mental health, medical history, cognitive function, and physical measures.
- •Laboratory and omics data (haematology, biochemistry, metabolomic, proteomic) and ICD-coded health outcomes, including cancer diagnoses with dates, were included.
- •UK Biobank shared these details with The BMJ; additional listings offered support for applying for (unspecified).