WSJ found out who was behind the largest hacker attack on Facebook

Behind the largest hack in the history of Facebook, which affected 30 million users, were spammers who wanted to make money from advertising, the WSJ found out . In the preliminary results of the investigation, no connection was recorded between the hacker attack and the authorities of foreign states.

Details

• Members of the social network's ongoing investigation believe a group of spammers who on Facebook and Instagram call themselves an "internet marketing company" were behind the hack, sources familiar with the investigation told the WSJ. According to them, Facebook's security experts were previously aware of the existence of these spammers.
• The hackers pursued financial goals, not ideological ones, sources say. Although initially it was the involvement of foreign states that caused more concern, since Russia, Iran, North Korea and China had already been noticed in carrying out cyber attacks for political purposes, the WSJ points out. The participation of government agencies was not ruled out by security experts, who noted that access to the profiles of 30 million Facebook users stolen during the hack could be useful to attackers collaborating with foreign authorities.
• According to Facebook , 15 million users were robbed of just their name, email address and phone number. The remaining 14 million also have additional information: for example, gender, religious affiliation, location, device data, pages liked and places where they were tagged. Facebook believes that the attackers did not post this information to the public.

Context

• the hacking of 50 million accounts Facebook announced at the end of September. The company clarified that the attackers used a vulnerability in the social network code that the View as tool had. With it, users could see how their profile looks on other people's screens ( read more about the tool ). Using this vulnerability, hackers could obtain access keys to the account of the person of interest to them. How long hackers used the vulnerability that appeared on the social network in July 2017, the company did not report. In addition to Facebook, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is also investigating the hack. Among those 50 million users whose accounts were hacked were Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg.
• After it became known about the hacking of accounts, Facebook shares lost 2.59% in a day, and the company's capitalization decreased by $12.6 billion, to $474.8 billion. Zuckerberg himself lost $1.66 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index . The company currently has a market capitalization of $459 billion.
• Due to this incident, the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) may fine Facebook 4% of global revenue, or about $1.63 billion.

Wired Edition

Liana Faizova