Facebook Deals With Security Breach, Millions Of User Records Exposed
MIAMI (CBSMiami) - More than 540 million records of Facebook users were publicly exposed on Amazon's cloud computing service.
According to the cyber-security firm "Upguard," two 'third-party' Facebook app developers posted private data including names, passwords, and email addresses.
Researchers said anyone who could find the information online could download it.
Facebook says the company's policies prohibit storing information in a public database.
The company also said that once it was alerted to the issue, Facebook worked with Amazon to take down the databases.
Facebook is under federal criminal investigation for deals it struck with electronics manufacturers to access user data, and it has been hit a series of security breaches over the past year.
The British analytics firm Cambridge Analytica, which worked with the Trump campaign in the 2016 election, got access to data from more than 87 million users; and Facebook last September said that an attack on its networks exposed information from nearly 50 million users.
Facebook said it has more than 2.3 billion active monthly users worldwide.