The social network stated that the leaked information related to a vulnerability that the company fixed in August 2019.
A cyber criminal managed to create a database using Mobile phone numbers for about 533 million Facebook users It is currently sold by “bot” from cableAlon Gal, co-founder of computer security company Hudson Rock, recently revealed.
As published on Monday MotherboardBy entering the phone number, the program allows you to discover the personal data of the corresponding Facebook user and vice versa. Although the initial search results are subject to partial censorship, the user can obtain credits for a “robot” to show his full number. Credit is $ 20 and rates can go up to $ 5,000 for 10,000 Credits.
In early 2020, a vulnerability was exploited that made it possible to see the phone number associated with each Facebook account, which led to the creation of a database containing the information of 533 million users in all countries, and it was not reported significantly, and the database today is more alarming 1 / 2 pic.twitter.com/ryQ5HuF1Cm
– Alon Gal (UnderTheBreach) January 14, 2021
According to the media, the creators of the “bot” have information on users from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and fifteen other countries.
“It is very worrying that a database of this size is being sold in cybercriminal communities,” It hurts our privacy badly It will surely be used for “fraud” and other fraudulent activities, “said Gall, adding that” it is important that The social networking site Facebook Users reported this gap so that they would not fall victim to various ‘hacking’ attempts.
A few days ago, a user created a Telegram bot which allows users to query the database for a low fee, allowing people to find phone numbers associated with a very large portion of Facebook accounts, and this clearly has a huge privacy impact. pic.twitter.com/lM1omndDET
– Alon Gal (UnderTheBreach) January 14, 2021
For its part, Facebook stated that the leaked information is related to A security vulnerability the company fixed in August 2019And the When the social network already had more than two billion users around the world, which confirms that it tested the “robot” with more recent data and did not show any results.