Facebook Employee Allegedly Used 'Privileged Access' to Cyber-Stalk Women
A Facebook security engineer has just been accused of stalking women and using his "privileged access" to the private data of Facebook users to do so. The social media company is now reportedly looking into these reports.
The accusations came from Jackie Stokes, founder of Spyglass Security. She first tipped the report via a post on Twitter on Sunday, April 29.
"I've been made aware that a security engineer currently employed at Facebook is likely using privileged access to stalk women online," she said in her tweet.
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"I have Tinder logs. What should I do with this information?" Stokes added, before also mentioning that she has confirmed that this alleged security engineer is employed by Facebook. She claims that she found this out by cross-referencing his Tinder profile details with LinkedIn and Keybase.io accounts.
"I really, really hope I'm wrong about this," she added in a later tweet, to which she added a snapshot of one of the text message exchanges presumably from the accused.
As for Facebook, they have assured their users, via an email to Motherboard, that they are aware of the report and are now looking into it. "Although we can't comment on any individual personnel matters, we are aware of the situation and investigating," a Facebook spokesperson wrote in the message.
Stokes have also made a follow-up post as an update to the situation. In her tweet last Monday, April 30, she thanked senior Facebook workers for their involvement.
"Thank you to the multiple senior @Facebook employees who have reached out to me with concern over this issue," she wrote, although the Spyglass founder did not elaborate on any new developments beyond that.
Facebook has also reached out to Gizmodo to explain the controls and policies they have in place to ensure that employees do not have unlimited access to user data. The explanation, however, does not deny that employees do have access to information "necessary" to do their work.
The company also explained that their access is limited by their role in the company, although it remains unclear on what exactly a Facebook security engineer may or may not have access to when it comes to the personal data of their users.
"We maintain strict technical controls and policies to restrict employee access to user data. Access is scoped by job function, and designated employees are only allowed to access the amount of information that's necessary to carry out their job responsibilities, such as responding to bug reports, account support inquiries, or valid legal requests," a Facebook representative explained.
The same message went on to assure users that Facebook has "zero tolerance" when it comes to abuses, and will result in termination for those involved.
Meanwhile, Stokes has also declined to comment further on the incident, after making her public accusation.
