Facebook Bug Which Changed Privacy Setting to Public Affected 14 Million Users

Facebook admitted that because of a bug in the platform, as high as, 14 million users posted publicly on their timelines despite their previous privacy settings. Under perilous times for the social media giant, this might be the second big blow it is facing since the start of this year. The social media giant stated that because of the bug users were suggested that they post publicly even if they had alternative privacy settings set to “friends only” or another private setting. It also added, that if users had missed out on noticing the new suggested change, then the post would have been publicly posted by default.

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Erin Egan, Chief privacy officer at Facebook, said that the bug had not affected past posts which users had already posted. Instead, it just tweaked the default posting settings while users made a new post. Now, Facebook is already in damage control and is informing the users who have been affected by the bug. The social media giant is also urging people to review their posts.

This news comes right after Facebook’s partnership with Huawei came into public knowledge wherein the social media giant was sharing user data with the Chinese smartphone manufacturer. Also, this year Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of the Senate for the Cambridge Analytica data scandal which led to a loss of information of 87 million Facebook users.

Elite educationists also did not shy away from making comments on this new revelation. Jonathan Mayer, a professor of computer science and public affairs at Princeton University said on Twitter that this latest privacy gaffe “looks like a viable Federal Trade Commission/state attorney general deception case.” Specially after the tightened scrutiny on Facebook, the social media giant had promised that it would be dedicated to maintaining users’ privacy and security which meant that users have control over the content which they share on the platform. However, in the case of this bug, it wasn’t taken care of.