What parents should know about Facebook new data scandal

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You may have seen in the news that Facebook’s 50 million users account may have been leaked. It is another announcement from the tech giant that it has failed to protect your personal information.

What is the leak about?

  • Hackers were trying to obtain information like “name, gender and hometown” that is connected to a user’s profile page
  • Facebook believes that private messages were not accessed
  • So far no credit card information was taken. This may change as the investigation is still on going 

Who is behind the attack?

  • Facebook does not know yet, FBI is still investigating 
  • In the past Facebook have found that Russia was trying to meddle in America’s election – but not to confirm that they are behind this attack 

How did the attack happen?

3 bugs caused the data exposure. There are 3 vulnerabilities in Facebook’s video uploader..When using the “View As’ feature to  view your profile as someone else, the video uploader would occasionally appear when it shouldn’t display at all.  This can cause the attacker to log into the account of the other person.

How to protect your children after such an incident :

1. Check if your child’s account have been hacked . 

  • To do this go to your account’s security and login page.
  • You can see where your child have logged in from. If they are prompted to log out of Facebook and had to log in again, you can see the devices they have logged in from.

2. Change your child’ password

According to Facebook there is no need to change your password following this scandal. But to be safe online it is important to regularly change your password and turn on the   two-factor authentication. Talk to your child about the importance of keeping password secure and changing it constantly

If your family have not been impacted by this scandal then you should talk to your child about removing some personal information that they may have shared in case there is any future attacks.

3. Talk to your child about online safety 

When such data breach happens talk to your child about the incident and the implications of it. Let them know that big tech companies can never protect them online. This goes not just for Facebook but all social media platform.

All the personal information your child have shared can be sucked out of them instantly. Once their data is exposed it is irreversible and Facebook cannot protect them from this.

Facebook also cannot protect your child from the content that is on their platform. The 20,000 moderation team they have in place  is inadequate to remove hate speech, violent graphic images and spam on their site. It is normally removed once it has been posted or streamed. So make sure your child is mature enough to be allowed on Facebook or any social media platform

Discussion points with your child:

  • Ask them if they have heard about the new data breach 
  • Let them know what the breach is about 
  • Ask them to check if their account have been hacked 
  • Talk to them about why it is important to NOT reveal personal information like hometown, address and phone number on any social media platform.  

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