Category: Facebook

WhatsApp, Instagram And Facebook Face Major Outage

The trio of social media platforms, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp have suffered from a massive outage that affected its users. These platforms have a combined user base that easily crosses over a billion. The latest outage marks the third major issue that has yet been faced by Facebook Inc. which owns the other two platforms.

Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp had started experiencing outages and issues in its service about 12 hours ago. The services are reportedly struggling across the globe, with the problem being severe in the East Coast and in Europe. Many WhatsApp users were either unable to send photos, videos and voice messages or were unable to receive them. However, text messages were unaffected and went through. Hashtags such as Instagram down have already trended on Twitter.

Instagram had issues regarding its stories and its cycle of post refreshes and preview. Users were either unable to open stories of their followers or see recent posts on their feeds. The problem made it seem like a loss of internet connectivity even if that was not the case. It is still unclear as to what seems to be causing these massive outages. The leading explanation points at a change in the server configuration. Facebook had experienced a massive outage in March, while Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp experienced another in the following month.

We’re back! The issue has been resolved and we should be back at 100% for everyone. We're sorry for any inconvenience. pic.twitter.com/yKKtHfCYMA
— Instagram (@instagram) July 3, 2019

Facebook has since acknowledged the latest issue plaguing its services. The company has stated that it is currently working to resolve the issues being faced by its large number of users on Instagram and WhatsApp. The services now appear to be almost completely restored for Facebook and WhatsApp, declared via a post shared on Twitter.

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The respective companies’ are hoping to keep the issue contained and never have to repeat it again. An apology was also issued alongside the announcement of it being fixed. Social media platforms are now an integral part of a modern individual’s life. Outages on social media platform such as Facebook showcase just how strongly it can impact the daily routine of a person.

July 4, 2019
Facebook Announces Its Cryptocurrency Named Libra

American social media giant Facebook has announced a digital currency called Libra on the 18th of June. It is a cryptocurrency that aims at allowing billions of Facebook users to make transactions globally. Libra is expected to debut in the year 2020 alongside a blockchain network supporting it. The company also introduced its newest subsidiary called Calibra, which is a payments interface that will leverage the various assets of Facebook like Messenger and WhatsApp.

About Libra

As mentioned above, Libra is the latest cryptocurrency backed by Facebook. The company believes it will be used for money transfer between people in developing countries; who do not have access to a proper banking structure. The final goal though is to develop the first mainstream cryptocurrency, which is in use more than Bitcoin. Facebook believes Libra will grow into a currency which is stable and decentralized; this means no country will have ruling rights over it. Although the social media company is developing the currency, it has formed the non-profit Libra Association alongside 27 other partners so help it develop and get the cryptocurrency into the mainstream market. These partners include names like Mastercard, Visa, eBay, PayPal, Uber and Vodafone.

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The aforementioned organizations together are set to contribute to an asset pool known as Libra Reserve. This will make sure that every Libra (a unit of the currency) is backed by something essential in nature. This is different than how Bitcoin works, as it relies on its rarity and insufficiency to increase in value. Facebook’s Libra is being viewed as a financial behemoth, due to the sheer number of people using Facebook actively, which is around 2.4 billion each month. However, as the company always finds itself in the middle of a privacy debate, it may also face a lot of criticism when it lands next year.

June 18, 2019
Facebook Is Paying Users For Tracking Their Smartphones

Facebook in a new announcement has planned to once again start paying users for being monitored. The ‘Study from Facebook’ application will monitor the user’s device, finding which apps are currently installed, duration of usage of said apps, track their location, and most importantly, record app data of users.

The monitored app data can uncover which features are being utilized in an app. The social media giant claims that it will not be able to track any specific information like messages, passwords or websites visited. The application has been launched months after Facebook’s last attempt at a user-monitoring software. Facebook Research, which was terminated after various controversies arose with the app being specifically marketed to teens, exclusively on the iPhone. The defunct app through special certification allowed itself to circumvent the App Stores and gain special access within Apple devices framework. This was a clear violation of Apple’s rules and regulations causing it to be shut down in January.

The company’s new move showcases its struggling effort in obtaining user’s data from their phones. Facebook, however, has learned a couple of things from its last public debacle. Study app will now only be available for people verified to be over the age of 18; being available exclusively on Android, where the users can choose to grant deeper access to the app. The monitoring software will now also highlight through different screens what type of user data has been collected and exactly how it’ll be used.

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Facebook has yet to specify exactly how much it will be paying the user’s to use the app. Although a recent blog post has confirmed that all research participants will be compensated. A PayPal account is mandatory for the study that will reference data that the company already has over the user and the data collected. The Study app has been launched in India and the US. Initially, only the users invited for a study by Facebook can use the app.

June 12, 2019
Facebook’s Cryptocurrency May Launch In June Itself

As reported previously, Social Media giant Facebook is planning to unveil its own cryptocurrency. The company is proposing to set up a digital payment system in up to twelve countries by the beginning of the year 2020. The currency is currently referred to as Globalcoin, but the name may change when Facebook outlines its plans in more details. Facebook also claimed that it has already completed talks with the Bank of England regarding the risks and opportunities of a new currency format. However, the latest reports state that the new currency may be unveiled in this month (June 2019) itself.

Apparently, the company is planning a huge push that will include bonuses for merchants that will adopt the cryptocurrency right away. Facebook also plans to introduce real-world kiosks where users can exchange their “GlobalCoins” for cash. Furthermore, the employees of the company can choose to be paid in the new cryptocurrency, an initiative that Facebook believes will encourage newer users to adopt the cryptocurrency with ease.

The project has been in the works for a while now and was codenamed Libra in the beginning. For the alleged project, Facebook will have to collaborate with various banks; which will allow it to exchange international currencies into Globalcoin. As mentioned before, it has already had a successful talk with the Bank of England, so this should not be a major problem.

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The major advantage Facebook will have with its currency Globalcoin over its rivals like Bitcoin and Ethereum is the sheer number of users of its various products. Over 2 billion people have been recorded to use Facebook actively and millions of other members of the audience are hooked to applications like Instagram and WhatsApp. Hence, these platforms can serve an important role in boosting the popularity of the new cryptocurrency. However, since Facebook has been involved in multiple security and data breaches in the past, the organization will have to establish a fair amount of trust in its users in order to make its cryptocurrency successful in the long run.

June 6, 2019
Facebook Ordered by US Judge to Turn Over Records on Data Privacy

As per latest reports, Facebook has been ordered by a US judge to turn over emails from various shareholders amongst other records. The records were related to the company’s model of handling data privacy and security. This happened as a consequence of when British Political Consulting firm Cambridge Analytica accessed private data of 87 million users in 2015.

Shareholders of the social media giant stated that they had a credible basis to believe in the fact that Facebook board members may have been involved in data privacy breaches. The breach involving Cambridge Analytica, however, was not revealed until the month of March 2018. It was noted that at the time of the breach, Facebook was subject to a US Federal Trade Commission consent decree that essentially required the company to strengthen its data security measures.

The shareholders in the organization filed a suit against Facebook in order to obtain various records concerning the Cambridge Analytica and other breaches. In case any anomalies would be detected with the reports, the shareholders can also sue the company officials and related directors via a derivative lawsuit. Basically, a shareholder derivative suit is brought by a shareholder on behalf of a corporation. A shareholder can only sue on behalf of a corporation when the corporation has a valid cause of action, but has decided not to use it.

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Cambridge Analytica was hired during US President Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign, and it used various profiling techniques to influence the behaviour of voters in general. However, as soon as the data breach was out in the open, it shut down, leading to the introduction of several US and European regulatory probes into Facebook. The company has been surrounded with controversies for quite some time now, including the disclosure of user passwords in plaintext to company employees. Current situations are not hinting towards the betterment of the scenario, indicating that Facebook needs to employ some serious discretionary measures in order to stabilize.

June 1, 2019
Facebook Patent Reveals A Drone Powered By Kites

A freshly revealed patent shows that Facebook is working on a drone which is quite unconventional. The drone will not use its own power source for flight, instead it would make use of kites to stay afloat. Named the “dual-kite aerial vehicle”, each drone consists of two separate kites that can be directed independently. Moreover, the drone can utilize the force of the wind to extend its flight time, essentially making it self-sufficient.

The patent was originally filed in the month of November 2018. It depicts a drone that is connected to the kites via a kiometre-long tether. It is designed along the lines of a helicopter-style aircraft, and by cutting down the size and weight of the drone, it can attain extra-long flight durations. Facebook also mentions that a fleet of such drones can be controlled wirelessly from the surface. Since higher altitudes imply more sunlight, they can be employed to generate power through solar panels as well.

The social media giant was previously reported to be working on Aquila, which was a project that involved beaming down an LTE network from high-flying droneships in the stratosphere. The drones in Aquila were supposed to run on solar energy, providing sustainable flight over long durations of time. However, the project didn’t really take ‘flight’, and was abandoned by the company in the year 2018.

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The drone in the freshly filed patent, however, is nothing like Aquila. It resembles the balloons that Google previously showcased for its Loon project. Nonetheless, the reveal should be taken with a grain of salt, since it could be long before we could get to witness such an offering from the company. With the privacy and security concerns looming over Facebook, it may not want to launch large drones into the sky anytime soon. However, considering that the organization previously teamed up with aviation giant Airbus to provide high altitude connectivity, a prototype may be under development as well.

May 31, 2019
Facebook To Launch Its Cryptocurrency Named Globalcoin Soon

Social media giant Facebook is planning to introduce its cryptocurrency soon, according to the latest reports. The company is planning to set up a digital payment system in about twelve countries at the beginning of the year 2020. The currency, referred to internally as Globalcoin, may be announced with a changed name by the end of this year when Facebook outlines its plans in more details. To reaffirm the reports, it is claimed the company has already completed the talks with the Bank of England about the risks and opportunities of a cryptocurrency. Facebook is seemingly also in talks with a few money transfer firms; to devise an affordable method for people without a bank account to send money

How Globalcoin Will Work?

According to reports, Facebook is looking forward to creating a digital-based currency; able to provide an affordable and secure way of transacting online. Like mentioned previously, the company aims to do the above without the need for the users to have a bank account. The project has been in the works for a while now and was codenamed Libra in the beginning. While it is referred to as Globalcoin internally, do not be surprised if the name is changed when it is announced officially. For the alleged project, Facebook will have to collaborate with various banks; which will allow it to exchange international currencies into Globalcoin.

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The major advantage Facebook will have with its currency Globalcoin over its rivals like Bitcoin and Ethereum; is the sheer number of users of its various products. Over 2 billion people have been recorded to use Facebook actively and millions of other audience are hooked to applications like Instagram and WhatsApp. By utilising these platforms and integrating its currency with them, Facebook can have a plethora of users of its currency in a short amount of time.

May 25, 2019
Facebook Admits To Have “Unintentionally Uploaded” 1.5 Million Email Addresses Without Consent

The world’s largest social media network, Facebook has been involved in a multitude of controversies over the past couple of years, and a majority of those were directly associated with security. Previously, Facebook claimed to have “accidentally” exposed millions of user passwords in plaintext to employees, which raised questions yet again regarding the privacy protocols of the company. As per fresh reports, Facebook claims to have “unintentionally uploaded” 1.5 million email addresses of new users.

As per sources, Facebook is taking necessary steps to fix this breach. A security researcher noticed that the social media platform was requesting email passwords from new users in order to verify their identities. If the user filled the password field with the intended details, Facebook automatically started importing the contact list associated with the respective email ID, that too without asking for permission to do so.

When this issue was brought to light, Facebook spokesperson came forward with a statement regarding the breach, which stated that a total of 1.5 million contacts were collected by the company. All these addresses were fed into the company’s database, where they were used to develop a web of connections allowing friend recommendations. However, Facebook refused to make a statement regarding the fact that the addresses were being used for advertisement based marketing or not.

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Additionally, Facebook is planning to notify the affected users regarding the uninformed data misuse by the company. Furthermore, the spokesperson also said that the American Social media organization is planning to delete all the collected email addresses off the databases. In the light of a variety of security breaches, Whatsapp co-founder previously urged students to stop using Facebook. With the number of improprieties building up over time, the company is facing grave times in the future, especially since a lot of users are being made aware of the same.

April 18, 2019
Facebook, Whatsapp, And Instagram Restore Services After Widespread Outage

On April 14 2019, a multitude of users faced issues while connecting to popular social media website, Facebook. The connection issues were not limited to Facebook, however, because Instagram and Whatsapp users were confronted with similar problems. This is not the first case when Facebook services have been down for a long time. Previously, in the month of March 2019, Instagram and Facebook faced a global outage that lasted for a long period of time (more than 24 hours). This time, the outage lasted for a shorter duration, but questions were still raised regarding Facebook’s vulnerability to external attacks.

Facebook’s spokesman stated that the company is acknowledging the issue faced by users and that all steps are being taken to resolve the issue. Apologizing for the inconvenience, the spokesman refused to divulge the cause of the outage. Rumours are floating around, which state that the reason for the outage of Facebook services was most likely a DDoS (Denial of Service) Attack. In a Denial of Service attack, multiple network nodes try to disrupt the server by accessing it at the same time.

Downdetector Reports

Downdetector.com indicated that at the peak time, over 12,000 users reported issues with Facebook connectivity throughout the world. Regarding other applications, Instagram had an outage count of over 7,000 users, whereas Whatsapp peaked at 3,000 user reports. The live outage map on the website clearly exhibited that the majority of issues arose from the Asian and European continental regions.

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Considering the popularity of the social media website, a downtime of even a few minutes is a cause of issue amongst its users, and when this happens on a regular basis, it turns into a matter of concern. A lot of people in the US did not face a similar issue, which hints towards the fact that maybe the Asian and European data centres for the company were attacked or disrupted because of some reason. Users may still face outages in the future, but as of now, the issue has been resolved as per the company.

April 15, 2019
Facebook Fixes Glitch That Exposed Users’ Passwords To Employees

Facebook’s indiscretions regarding their users’ security policies have been quite frequent over the last few months, a fresh serious loophole has been detected in the social media platform. As per the sources, the American organization admitted to a bug that apparently exposed all user passwords to the employees of the company. And on top of that, all the passwords were stored in plaintext, not in an encoded manner. Reportedly, the passwords date back to 2012.

About The Encryption

Organizations usually encode user passwords with a process called hashing, which includes the transformation of a string of characters into a usually shorter fixed-length value or key that represents the original string. Doing so encrypts the passwords and only allows access to those who have the encryption key/hashing key. In this case, Facebook failed to take the necessary steps for the same and ended up making a mistake that could’ve provided hackers with an unlocked playground.

Effects Of The Bug

Facebook’s VP stated that the flaw was detected as a part of a routine security review in the month of January. He also stated that Facebook’s login technology employs a different strategy that doesn’t risk the exposure of sensitive data. Also, he mentioned that the company had found no evidence of the data being accessed improperly and that the passwords were never visible to any person outside the organization. After being brought to light, the company itself came forward with a statement that it will notify all the Facebook and Instagram users regarding the bug, and how it has fixed all instances of the same.

Previously in 2018, crackers stole a bunch of data files from almost 50 million users. This was done by accessing the account access tokens of users, which gave the attackers access to the account details. Consequently, this information was further processed, which led to the discovery of the aforementioned password exposing bug in the internal system.

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Facebook cleared up things by saying that all the exposed passwords were stored in different places on the platform, indicating that they weren’t vulnerable to any one single form of attack. Also, the company stated that the passwords were not captured via login credentials, instead, a lot of internal mechanisms like crash logs had given birth to plaintext passwords. It is interesting to see how Facebook will keep up with the loopholes emerging in the systems since social media security is a huge concern these days.

March 22, 2019
Whatsapp Co-Founder Urges Students To Stop Using Facebook

Students of Stanford University were urged to delete their Facebook accounts by Brian Acton, the co-founder of Whatsapp on March 13. While speaking at a panel in the University, he explained his reasons for selling the hugely-popular Instant messaging app to Mark Zuckerberg for a whopping sum of US$ 19 billion in 2014.

His Statement

Brian Acton accused Facebook users of giving power and control over to the company. Reportedly, he also involved a former Facebook software engineer in his comments, stating that he still held strong differences with the Social Media company. He also stated that he left the company at the end of 2017 because Facebook was planning to add advertisements to the Instant Messaging Platform, thus integrating a business viewpoint directly with the users of the app.

https://twitter.com/brianacton/status/976231995846963201

The 47-year-old Stanford alumni previously tweeted “It is time. #deletefacebook” in March 2018. At Stanford, he further pinpointed that Facebook’s current reach is outrageously high because it owns Instagram and Messenger as well. The total number of users across all these platforms are well over a billion, although the popularity of the social media app itself has reduced drastically in recent months. Facebook and Instagram suffered major outages worldwide on March 13. A lot of users were hinting at a DDoS attack, however, Facebook clarified to its users that the issue was not related to any form of DDoS attack.

We're focused on working to resolve the issue as soon as possible, but can confirm that the issue is not related to a DDoS attack.
— Meta (@Meta) March 13, 2019

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The former Yahoo employee mentioned that he also had to think about his employees and the money that they would make from the sale of Whatsapp. Furthermore, he also had to take his investors and his own minority stake into consideration while making the deal.

March 15, 2019
Facebook Mobile Application Update Introduces Dedicated Gaming Section
In a survey, it was discovered that Facebook Live Streams generated almost three times more views than those videos which are not live. Facebook live streaming is a major thing now, with content creators flocking to get their content noticed on the world’s most popular social media platform. More and more users have becoming aware of the fact that Facebook can be used for much more than just sharing images and posting comments. To address the growing gaming community, the American social media company has added a dedicated gaming section in its smartphone application.

Features Of The Update

With an approximate 700 million users interacting with game-based content (as per Facebook), live streaming is becoming a platform to connect with gamers over social media. Previously, users discovered new gaming channels via their news feed, where they followed the streamer’s page and got notified every time they went live. To make it easier to find live games at one place, Facebook is rolling out an update which adds a gaming tab in the app navigation bar, using which gamers and other users can discover popular games being streamed around their area, as well as gaming content from the creators they follow.

The newly added Facebook Gaming Tab enables the user to:
- Play Games: Facebook has a host of fun games that users can check out when there are no notifications waiting for them. Using the tab, gamers can play games, start chats with other gamers, invite their friends to play and share high scores with each other.
- Watch Live & Offline Gaming Videos: If the user has followed a particular streamer/gamer, he/she will see the most recently published videos from that account. Moreover, as mentioned before, popular videos posted by game publishers and esports organizations will also be showcased in the tab. Based on the user’s preferences, Facebook will also recommend users new gaming content developers in the gaming tab.
- Join Dedicated Gaming Groups: There is a huge number of gaming groups on Facebook for almost every game out there, where users can directly interact with like-minded people. The company states that Gaming groups are the most engaging communities of Facebook, so it would be interesting to see how Facebook will integrate gaming groups in the new tab.
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Facebook stated that it is rolling out the new update in small batches to the 700 million people who enjoy gaming. The company also plans to launch a standalone Facebook Gaming app on Android, the beta testing for which has already begun.
March 15, 2019
Facebook Messenger Bug Can Leak Sensitive User Information

Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg posted his vision to eradicate the privacy concerns surrounding the social media website. In his article, he claimed that the company will focus on gaining the trust of its users and ensuring better product development. The social media company aims to achieve high privacy standards in the next few years while sticking to all necessary norms at the same time.

About The Bug

A report states that a bug in Facebook Messenger gave permission to websites to access users’ private data, including the people they have been exchanging messages with. It was reported by researchers that the vulnerability was in direct violation of the user-organization privacy policy since the data of the user wasn’t safe at all. Although the issue was reported to Facebook as per its Responsible Disclosure Program, the bug was mitigated via social media. As of now, the bug has been fixed by the company.

Previous Privacy Concerns

Also, as reported on March 5, users blamed Facebook for misusing their phone numbers. As per Facebook’s two-factor authentication, users had to sign up with their phone numbers, which were visible to advertisers. Consequently, a lot of users were being pestered by advertisements from sources they were not even familiar with.

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It is still yet to be clear how Facebook will get rid of the multitude of bugs that are present in the social media website/app. The company states that it will achieve “Whatsapp-like” privacy and encryption in the upcoming months, but with the discovery of bugs almost every week, Facebook might need to step up its privacy checks.

March 9, 2019
Facebook Announces Its Vision For Privacy Focussed Social Networking
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a post from his account about the company’s next move to create a more privacy focussed social network. In his over 3,000 words long article about privacy and building trust of the users, he claimed that his company will be more open to product developments. There were six principles that were shared in the post, aiming to serve as a guideline for future development for the company. These principles are expected to take place in the next few years.

Facebook & Privacy

While Facebook has been criticised about its privacy policies and has seen its fair share of controversies regarding the matter, the company in the post aims to take a firm stand on the matter in the future. The six principles for the company highlighted in the Facebook posts are as follows:
- Private interactions
- Encryption
- Reducing Permanence
- Safety
- Interoperability
- Secure data storage
Facebook claims that they are planning to rebuild more of its services around the above ideas. Understanding privacy concerns, the company also reaffirmed that it start the development and changes openly and collaboratively. Zuckerberg said that the public sharing on the platform will decline in the next few years because people will shift towards private messaging via Messenger or WhatsApp, which will be the main way they will communicate on the Facebook network.

Facebook is also expected to implement end-to-end encryption to all of its communication networks. The post also claimed that will limit the time it will store the user’s messaging metadata. The company got into trouble a few weeks ago for storing and recording data. It will also add a feature to its every service that will allow them to send a message, a report of this feature was also hinted a few weeks ago. The reports said that it planning on adding cross-texting between Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.

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The steps that Facebook seems to be emphasizing upon seem like a step in the right direction for the company, Considering that its reputation hasn’t been great in terms of privacy and collecting user data.
March 7, 2019
Facebook Paying Users in Exchange For Their Data

Facebook and controversies go hand in hand. Just last year, it was caught in a huge privacy scandal that brought Facebook a lot of hate; as it compromised the data of a lot of users. Looks like Facebook is caught in a similar scandal again. Reports show that Facebook is seeking people to test its research app. This is to spy on them in exchange of money.

Facebook did that to get data on its competitors, so the best way they thought they could accomplish it by asking the users for their data directly. The Facebook Research App, available for both Android and iOS. This App is installed through a website, which then installs certain certificates on your device. These certificates transfer data like your phone and web activity back to Facebook. This was compensated by an amount up to $20.

Spotted first by TechCrunch, The program is administered through beta testing services Applause, BetaBound and uTest; to cloak Facebook’s involvement. The program is referred to in some documentation as “Project Atlas”- a fitting name for Facebook’s effort to map new trends and rivals around the globe.

Facebook’s Affair With Data Theft

In its report, The publication said “The strategy shows how far Facebook is willing to go and how much it’s willing to pay to protect its dominance — even at the risk of breaking the rules of Apple’s iOS platform on which it depends. Apple could seek to block Facebook from continuing to distribute its Research app, or even revoke it permission to offer employee-only apps, and the situation could further chill relations between the tech giants.”

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Facebook has had a reputation for not caring about users privacy over the years. When it acquired the mobile data counter Onavo, it helped them track user app data. This led to Apple banning the app last year. The app is still available on Android. Over that, this incident doesn’t help the reputation of Facebook and may tarnish it further. Facebook hasn’t released a statement yet.

January 30, 2019