PremiumWhile several narratives of brutal layoffs being conducted by big tech companies like Amazon, Twitter, Meta has surfaced, a report has revealed that Meta Platforms ‘disciplined’ more than two dozen of their employees and contractors in the past year for improperly taking over user accounts.
The report published by Wall Street Journal states that Meta had sacked these employees and contractors for allegedly taking bribes and also taking over user accounts by improper means.
The WSJ report states that some of these employees had taken thousands of dollars in bribe in return for giving hackers access to user accounts.
A Meta spokesman told WSJ that the company will continue taking “appropriate action" against people that sell fraudulent services and target its platforms.
It is to be noted that the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp holds data on more than 3.7 billion users. This makes the company and their users a prime target for hackers.
Meta had last month informed that they had been planning to notify about 1 million Facebook users that their account credentials were compromised by malicious apps.
Meta, along with other major technology companies, has also been tricked into providing sensitive personal information about customers in response to fraudulent legal requests.
The report by WSJ, which quoted people familiar of the development and investigation, said that contractors who were working as security guards were given access to a Facebook tool called “Oops", an acronym for “Online Operations," that lets employees help users who have forgotten their passwords or had their accounts taken over by hackers.
A number of third-party services with access to Meta employees have begun charging users to reset accounts, WSJ noted. A Meta spokesman, quoted by WSJ, said that buying or selling accounts or paying for account recovery violates the company’s terms of service.
Meanwhile, Facebook parent Meta on Thursday announced the appointment of Sandhya Devanathan as the Vice President of Meta India. Meta Platforms appointed Sandhya Devanathan as its India head days after Ajit Mohan quit to join rival Snap Inc.