Data of 533 million Facebook users being sold via Telegram bot: Report

In fresh trouble for Facebook, phone numbers of 533 million users are currently being sold via a bot on encrypted messaging platform Telegram, which came from a Facebook vulnerability that was patched by the social network in 2019.

According to a report in Motherboard, the person selling the database full of Facebook users’ phone numbers (it’s $20 per number) lets customers lookup those numbers by using an automated Telegram bot.

Alon Gal, co-founder and CTO of cybersecurity firm Hudson Rock first alerted about the Telegram bot selling Facebook users’ information.

“It is very worrying to see a database of that size being sold in cybercrime communities, it harms our privacy severely and will certainly be used for smishing (the fraudulent practice of sending text messages) and other fraudulent activities by bad actors,”