Facebook was launched as a revolutionary product and somehow it still one of the most used social network, but over the past years, it has been surrounded by various scandals. No matter how Facebook tries to not get caught but somehow it still ends up in hot water. Facebook was accused of abusing user personal information and selling it to marketers and the platform was also blamed for spreading misinformation. Facebook hire a number of new employees in order to not let any more scandals rise but we guess it’s happening again.
Recently Facebook was accused again for violating user privacy by automatically requesting user phone numbers from carriers.
We all want to use this social platform as our majority circle of friends is here but along with entertainment every person wants to have secured personal information on the platform but Facebook is not doing that at all. We thought enabling two-factor authentication would help us secure our account but that’s not what Facebook is using it for. Apparently, the mobile numbers enabled by users for two-factor authentication are used by Facebook to match users with their real-life friends using the phone numbers from friends associated phone books.
Well if anyone has your contact saved in their phone and their phone books are associated with Facebook then the platform would be able to match you with almost every person you share your number with. Whether it is a hookup you don’t want to meet again or your electrician, your saved phone number in their phone book can easily give Facebook your user information even if you don’t intend to.
The reveal of this information caused chaos in the users but that’s not even the bigger story. The bigger revelation is that Facebook has the ability to get user phone numbers by requesting it from the carriers. Apparently, the phone app of Facebook has a built-in API that enables the platform to easily get user phone numbers from the carriers.
An app researcher named Jane Manching Wong recently reported this and the aim behind this news was to only aware the users about the workings of Facebook and also about their authority to easily opt-out of this if they want to.
If you take a look at this from some another perspective, phone numbers aren’t that much private for some people but also to keep in mind that for some users phone numbers can reveal a lot of personal information to the person who has the number and this is indeed scary.
Read next: Facebook's Android app is using a collector to gather user’s system libraries information
Recently Facebook was accused again for violating user privacy by automatically requesting user phone numbers from carriers.
We all want to use this social platform as our majority circle of friends is here but along with entertainment every person wants to have secured personal information on the platform but Facebook is not doing that at all. We thought enabling two-factor authentication would help us secure our account but that’s not what Facebook is using it for. Apparently, the mobile numbers enabled by users for two-factor authentication are used by Facebook to match users with their real-life friends using the phone numbers from friends associated phone books.
Well if anyone has your contact saved in their phone and their phone books are associated with Facebook then the platform would be able to match you with almost every person you share your number with. Whether it is a hookup you don’t want to meet again or your electrician, your saved phone number in their phone book can easily give Facebook your user information even if you don’t intend to.
- Also read: Unlinking Instagram-Facebook Account Feature Is Not as Effective as Most of the Users Think
The reveal of this information caused chaos in the users but that’s not even the bigger story. The bigger revelation is that Facebook has the ability to get user phone numbers by requesting it from the carriers. Apparently, the phone app of Facebook has a built-in API that enables the platform to easily get user phone numbers from the carriers.
An app researcher named Jane Manching Wong recently reported this and the aim behind this news was to only aware the users about the workings of Facebook and also about their authority to easily opt-out of this if they want to.
If you take a look at this from some another perspective, phone numbers aren’t that much private for some people but also to keep in mind that for some users phone numbers can reveal a lot of personal information to the person who has the number and this is indeed scary.
Bottom Line
We all know Facebook has been surrounded by scandals for so long and currently, it’s already under the antitrust investigation in the USA so if this discovery is true it might put a huge impact on the reputation of the social media giant. So if you want to be safe from this mess of data scooping, simply opt-out of this option and not give access to your personal number to Facebook.Read next: Facebook's Android app is using a collector to gather user’s system libraries information
