days since last facebook scandal

(20/05/2019) Thanks to Facebook, Your Cellphone Company Is Watching You More Closely Than Ever

According to a confidential document the Intercept had access to, Facebook gives away information about your phone that is used by your mobile phone carrier.

Facebook’s cellphone partnerships are particularly worrisome because of the extensive surveillance powers already enjoyed by carriers like AT&T and T-Mobile: Just as your internet service provider is capable of watching the data that bounces between your home and the wider world, telecommunications companies have a privileged vantage point from which they can glean a great deal of information about how, when, and where you’re using your phone. AT&T, for example, states plainly in its privacy policy that it collects and stores information “about the websites you visit and the mobile applications you use on our networks.” Paired with carriers’ calling and texting oversight, that accounts for just about everything you’d do on your smartphone.

Sources

• The Intercept: Thanks to Facebook, Your Cellphone Company Is Watching You More Closely Than Ever (20/05/2019)

(05/01/2019) Facebook wants to scan encrypted person-to-person WhatsApp messages for content Facebook or repressive governments dislike

Facebook plans to install an on-phone AI content moderation algorithm that would flag a post and prevent it from being sent if a user attempts to send a rules-violating post via encrypted WhatsApp message.

Sources

• Forbes: Facebook's Edge AI Content Scanning Brings NSA-Style Surveillance And Censorship To The Planet (05/05/2019)
• Facebook for developers: Applying AI to Keep the Platform Safe (05/01/2019)

(18/04/2019) Facebook waited until the Mueller report dropped to tell us millions of Instagram passwords were exposed

Given the terrible run of form it’s been on over the last year, it probably shouldn’t be that surprising that Facebook waited until the highly anticipated report on Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election to deliver some bad news.

Sources

• QZ: Facebook waited until the Mueller report dropped to tell us millions of Instagram passwords were exposed (18/04/2019)

(18/04/2019) "Ooops, I accidentally shared your contact list"

Facebook says it 'unintentionally uploaded' 1.5 million people's email contacts without their consent

Sources

• Business Insider: Facebook harvested the email contacts of 1.5 million users without their knowledge or consent when they opened their accounts (18/04/2019)

(11/04/2019) Mark Zuckerberg leveraged Facebook user data to fight rivals and help friends, leaked documents show

Facebook’s leaders seriously discussed selling access to user data — and privacy was an afterthought.

Sources

• NBCNews: Mark Zuckerberg leveraged Facebook user data to fight rivals and help friends, leaked documents show (11/04/2019)

(3/04/2019) Hundreds of millions of Facebook records exposed on public servers – report

Material discovered on Amazon cloud servers in latest example of Facebook letting third parties extract user data

Sources

• The Guardian: Hundreds of millions of Facebook records exposed on public servers – report (3/04/2019)

(7/03/2019) Facebook Messenger bug revealed who you had conversations with

Imperva, a cybersecurity company, on Thursday detailed a flaw with Facebook Messenger that allowed potential attackers to learn who you were talking with on the chatting service.

The security bug didn't show the content of the messages, but just knowing who you were in touch with has the potential to harm your privacy, said Ron Masas, the security researcher who discovered the vulnerability.

Sources

• CNET: Facebook Messenger bug revealed who you had conversations with(7/03/2019)

(24/01/2019) Facebook pays teens to install VPN that spies on them

Desperate for data on its competitors, Facebook has been secretly paying people to install a “Facebook Research” VPN that lets the company suck in all of a user’s phone and web activity, similar to Facebook’s Onavo Protect app that Apple banned in June and that was removed in August.

Sources:

• TechCrunch: Facebook pays teens to install VPN that spies on them (29/01/2019)
• TechCrunch: Apple bans Facebook’s Research app that paid users for data

(18/12/2018) Facebook allowed Netflix, Microsoft, Spotify and Amazon access to private messages and personal information of users

The 18 December 2018, the New York Times reveals that Facebook had given extended access to user data, on a much wider scope that it has previously disclosed.

Sources:

• The New York Times: Facebook gives access to private messages to 3rd party partners (18/12/2018)
• Libération: Partage des données : Facebook et ses partenaires particuliers (19/12/2018)
• Usbek & Rica: Pour les partenaires de Facebook, vos données personnelles, c'est open bar (19/12/2018)
• BFMTV: Facebook a laissé Netflix et Spotify accéder à tous vos messages privés (19/12/2018)

(1/11/18) Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens

In 2014, Facebook filed a patent application for a technique that employs smartphone data to figure out if two people might know each other. The author, an engineering manager at Facebook named Ben Chen, wrote that it was not merely possible to detect that two smartphones were in the same place at the same time, but that by comparing the accelerometer and gyroscope readings of each phone, the data could identify when people were facing each other or walking together. That way, Facebook could suggest you friend the person you were talking to at a bar last night, and not all the other people there that you chose not to talk to.

Sources:

• Gizmodo: Facebook Knows How to Track You Using the Dust on Your Camera Lens (1/11/2018)