Facebook has frequently been at the receiving end of criticism when it comes to guarding user’s privacy. Although the social network has strived hard over the years to ensure user privacy, every few days a new issue pops up which pins the blame squarely at it.
Now, for instance, reports from a number of Facebook users are trickling in, suggesting that they are able to view private Facebook messages being publicly displayed on their Facebook Timelines.
The issue seems to be affecting Facebook profiles randomly, so you may or may not witness it from your account. The whole thing is apparently the result of a bug which results in pre-2009 private messages being posted straight to your Timeline, to be read by anyone who visits it.
The messages are being displayed as ‘Posted by Friends’ on the Timeline. So far, no official word from Facebook has confirmed or denied the reports and the story is still unfolding. If you are experiencing the issue, do mention this in a comment below.
Update: Facebook has now released an official statement citing the whole thing to be a misunderstanding. The statement reads, “A small number of users raised concerns after what they mistakenly believed to be private messages appeared on their Timeline. Our engineers investigated these reports and found that the messages were older wall posts that had always been visible on the users’ profile pages. Facebook is satisfied that there has been no breach of user privacy.”
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