Reports indicate that multiple users were shocked to discover that their device cameras were secretly recording them "in the background" as they scrolled through their newsfeeds, even though they had never given the Facebook app permission to do this.
Many of these individuals took to Twitter to report the disturbing news, which quickly sent a shockwave across the social mediasphere reminding people that personal privacy is now a thing of the past, at least if you own electronic devices that have access to the internet.
According to CNET, which successfully replicated the "bug" using its own tests, the issue is easily identifiable when a user switches out of full-screen mode after looking at a photo or video. A bug in Facebook's mobile layout shifts the screen slightly to the right upon minimization, and in the open space to the left it becomes apparent that the user's camera was mysteriously activated.
As news about this "bug" started to circulate, Guy Rosen, Facebook's "Vice President of Integrity," took to Twitter to announce that his company is now looking into the matter.
"We recently discovered our iOS app incorrectly launched in landscape," Rosen wrote in his tweet.
"In fixing that last week in v246 we inadvertently introduced a bug where the app partially navigates to the camera screen when a photo is tapped. We have no evidence of photos/videos uploaded due to this."
In a later statement, Rosen flat-out declared that Facebook had not captured any photos or videos as a result of this "bug."
Every Apple "upgrade" these days is just another bug-ridden scam to further erode users' privacy protections
But not everyone is convinced, including Daryl Lasafin, Creative Director at the marketing agency Dame Digital in the Philippines.
After initially dismissing the issue as the mere "glitch" that Facebook claims it was, Lasafin noticed that all throughout the day as he was using Facebook on his mobile phone, the camera kept being activated in the background.
"I thought it was just my phone or the app acting up," Lasafin is quoted as saying. "Then I observed it became more persistent that evening."
Lasafin tried to troubleshoot the problem on his own by uninstalling and reinstalling the Facebook app, as well as removing all permissions for Facebook to access his phone's camera. But none of this fixed a thing, as the Facebook app continued to turn on his camera without his permission.
Interestingly, after Lasafin revoked all permissions for the Facebook app on his phone, the only thing that popped up was a black screen.
Not at all surprising is the fact that this "bug" is only occurring on Apple iPhones that have the latest iOS version installed on them. According to Next Web, the "bug" did not appear in iOS 12, suggesting that Apple's latest "upgrade" is nothing more than a scam – as is Apple's latest "upgrade" for MacOS, known as "Catalina," which is similarly ridden with "bugs."
Android users are reportedly not affected in any way by this Facebook camera "bug."
This latest violation by Facebook only adds insult to injury when it comes to the company's total disregard for people's personal privacy. As you may recall, Facebook had no choice but to fork out $5 billion in fines back in the summer for various other privacy violations, which has made the company one of the least-trusted tech giants in Silicon Valley.
"Facebook's reputation on privacy is so worrying that many people still believe the social network is secretly recording people through their microphones," notes Alfred Ng from CNET.
For more related news about corruption at Facebook, be sure to check out Facebook.Fetch.news.
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