// NEWS // Facebook Has 'Mistakenly' Collected Email Contacts for 3 Years

vijbzabyss (69)in #life • 5 years ago (edited)

Facebook recognizes having collected emails from 1.5 million contacts for almost three years. And they say that this personal data collection was not intentional...

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Facebook has not finished admitting or confirming errors in the processing of users' personal data. Repairing the social network, as Mark Zuckerberg personally committed, will take time.

It is now discovered that Facebook has "unintentionally" collected the email contacts of about 1.5 million of its users over the last three years.

Contacts collected during a security procedure

The activity was revealed when a security researcher noticed that Facebook asked users to enter their email password to verify their identity when they authenticate to an account.

On this occasion, Internet users saw a pop-up informing them that their contacts were imported, without first asking them for consent. A spokesperson confirms this practice and said that the email contacts of 1.5 million users have been collected since May 2016.

And if this data collection was set up by the platform, it is to recommend connections with other users of the social network. Last month, however, Facebook removed the password verification email, and thus stopped collecting contacts during the process.

"When we looked into the steps people were going through to verify their accounts, we found that in some cases people’s email contacts were also unintentionally uploaded to Facebook when they created their account", the Facebook spokesperson said.

An error then. 🙃

"We’ve fixed the underlying issue and are notifying people whose contacts were imported. And these contacts were not shared with anyone and we’re deleting them."

The social network also points out that users can view and manage the contacts they share with Facebook in their settings.

This is not the first time Facebook has taken advantage of a security procedure to collect personal data. This is the case, for example, with the telephone number requested for activating double authentication. Indeed, Facebook also exploits mobile numbers collected to broadcast targeted advertising.

Would you not have a déjà vu impression? ^^

Stay Informed, Stay Safe