Facebook has reportedly laid off 52 of its employees. The reason is because they were found to be abusing access to Facebook user data.
These 52 employees use their access to collect user data through Facebook’s internal system. They can see the user’s location, private messages, deleted photos and more according to reports from the Telegraph.
In the report, it is explained where a Facebook engineer employee was on holiday with a woman in Europe. When the two quarreled and the woman wanted time alone, using Facebook data, the employee tracked down her boyfriend at her new hotel and confronted him.
In another case, an employee reportedly used Facebook data to find out that a woman he liked regularly visited Dolores Park in San Francisco. Then use that information to go there and find him with his friend.
The majority of employees who misuse personal information are men who seek out women they like but do not face them directly.
The layoffs of 52 employees occurred in 2014 and 2015. Facebook’s chief security officer at the time, Alex Stamos, reportedly had warned that hundreds of other employees might have fled unnoticed.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is allegedly upset at learning of the widespread misuse of user information. He also asked why no one else at the company was thinking of tightening employee access to data.
But Zuckerberg himself had designed the company’s data access system and refused to change it as the company grew, according to the report.
"In the course of Facebook's history there are paths we can take, decisions we can make that will limit, or even reduce, the user data we collect," a longtime Facebook employee told Frankel and Kang as quoted by Fox News.
"But that's against Markm's DNA. Even before we give him that choice, we know it's not the path he's going to choose." he added.
In a statement, a Facebook spokesperson said the company does not tolerate abuse and has fired employees who were found to be accessing data incorrectly.
"Since 2015, we have continued to strengthen employee training, abuse detection, and prevention protocols. We have also continued to reduce the need for engineers to access various types of data as they work to develop and support our services." said a Facebook spokesperson.
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