Try as they might to suppress the story, Facebook has been compromised to the tune of 50 million of their users’ data falling into the hands of unknown parties. If you are upset about that, just think how mad Facebook must be. They’re trying to sell your information to the highest bidder, not have it stolen out from underneath their noses.
It wasn’t that long ago that Mark Zuckerberg said: “We have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can’t then we don’t deserve to serve you.” On Friday, his company announced that they had suffered a data breach that had affected up to 50 million of its subscribers. Facebook apparently discovered the breach early last week and immediately contacted the FBI; as the exploitation allowed hackers to take over the affected accounts, Facebook was forced to log out over 90 million users to ensure that their accounts could be secured. According to Guy Rosen, vice president of product management, “There’s no need for anyone to change their passwords.” It is unknown who is behind the attack or exactly what personal data was accessed.
However, as Facebook announced the breach, the social media site’s users found that they were being blocked from sharing articles on Facebook from news outlets like the Associated Press and The Guardian reporting the breach. When users went to share articles from several major media outlets, they were being blocked as “potential spam.” While I find the news that The Guardian was being blocked as spam absolutely delicious, this is a serious problem. In the event of a breach, users should be able to share the news with their network in a rapid fashion. The message that was generated when users attempted to share some of these articles was “Our security systems have detected that a lot of people are posting the same content, which could mean that it’s spam.” While this is a good idea, in theory, you would think that stories from the Associated Press would not be flagged as spam content.
It would be dishonest to not mention why Mark Zuckerberg initially made that statement earlier this year about how “we have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can’t then we don’t deserve to serve you.” It was regarding the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and the way in which Facebook monetizes your private information came under fire by lawmakers as well as Facebook users. It is interesting to see how flippant Facebook was about leveraging the data of private citizens to turn a profit in the multibillion-dollar company —intentionally obscuring its own standards and practices from the public and only hesitantly answering for their actions when questioned by Congress— but is quick to call the FBI and express outrage when the information is stolen rather than paid for. They’re willing to unapologetically sell you out to the highest bidder, while pretending that their security vulnerabilities leaking your information is somehow a different sort of injustice.
Of course, this shouldn’t come as a surprise to anybody who is paying attention. Zuckerberg was calling the first 4,000 users on Facebook “dumb f*cks” for trusting him with their private, personal information back in 2004. When he says they don’t deserve to serve you, he means it.
