Facebook is not having a good fall.
In addition to allowing up to 30 million user accounts to be hacked, there’s the bombshell report that the company hired a PR firm to discredit activist protesters by tying them to the liberal financier George Soros. Now, Instagram user passwords may be the victim of an accidental data leak.
According to the Information, Instagram notified an unconfirmed number of affected users that a new tool that debuted in April was the cause of the security error. Called “Download Your Data,” the tool is a strong dose of irony, allowing users to see how much of their personal data Instagram has collected. The tool was created to comply with new data privacy regulations in Europe, although one imagines that having a customer base that’s increasingly worried about their privacy is another core motivator.
https://twitter.com/sebimweb/status/1063477853025693696
The tool sent users their password as plaintext in the provided URL, and inexplicably, the passwords were also stored on Facebook’s servers. The notification sent out to users says that the data has been deleted and the tool updated to avoid future incidents.
A spokesperson issued a statement to the Information, saying the issue impacted a “small number of people,” but conceded that people sharing a network may also have had their data compromised. Users who didn’t receive a notification are apparently fine, but it never hurts to enable two-factor authorization if you haven’t already.
Need more help? Here’s how to repost on Instagram, how to post longer videos to Instagram, the easy way to save Instagram videos, and the simple way to add music to your Instagram videos. You can also download full-resolution Instagram photos.
If you’re looking to spice things up, here are some tips for Instagram flirting and how to find porn on Instagram (and instructions on how to clear your search history). If you’re feeling petty, here’s how to tell if someone blocked you on Instagram and see all of the people who unfollowed you. You can also disconnect Facebook from Instagram or unblock someone. For more tips, see our ultimate beginner’s guide to Instagram.
H/T the Information via Engadget