A Belgian hacker named Inti De Ceukelaire who is also a security researcher has recently discovered a new method that sabotages the Facebook’s claim to protect the users’ data through its comprehensive privacy setting features. The hacker has discovered that he can use this exploit and obtain cell phone numbers of users on Facebook, which they have kept private.
According to Ceukelaire, he can easily identify the mobile numbers of popular personalities and also celebrities just by simply checking out their Facebook profile. He did it by analysing the numbers which are associated with their profiles. You should note that these numbers are supposed to be private and not available to be seen by anyone.
Reportedly, De Ceukelaire proved that his claim is true by obtaining the cell number of Jan Jambon, Interior Minister for Belgium, just from his Facebook profile. He further stated that: “For clarity, I can find out his number on his account but not vice versa. Roughly, I think you get the number 20 percent of the Flemish people could find that way. Rest all the people who have their mobile number linked to their profile goes into the huge bite of 80 percent.”
twitter.com/intidc/status/819176305824591872/photo/1
Ceukelaire has already warned the Facebook security team about this issue twice and he stated that he might expose it to the public if they did not fix the issue and make necessary changes as soon as possible. However, according to Facebook’s representatives, this is not a vulnerability and it has been seen as a feature rather than as an exploit. He also notified law enforcement authorities about the exploitable aspect of this feature.