CompiMar 26, 2024
Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai

NEW: Facebook snooped on Snapchat users' encrypted network traffic to study how they behaved, unsealed court documents reveal.

This was part of a secret program called "Project Ghostbusters," and even inside the company, it was very controversial.

“I can’t think of a good argument for why this is okay. No security person is ever comfortable with this, no matter what consent we get from the general public. The general public just doesn’t know how this stuff works,” Pedro Canahuati, Facebook's then-head of security engineering, wrote in an email.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/03/26/facebook-secret-project-snooped-snapchat-user-traffic/

Facebook snooped on users' Snapchat traffic in secret project, documents reveal | TechCrunch

A secret program called "Project Ghostbusters" saw Facebook devise a way to intercept and decrypt the encrypted network traffic of Snapchat users to study their behavior.

TechCrunch
Mar 26, 2024 at 9:09pmWeb
Show threadJohnMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb 🫠
Show threadgh0sti Mar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb gross on all levels. Zuck is really a piece of shit and keeps lowering the bar.
Show threadAral BalkanMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb @malwaretech Surveillance capitalists gonna surveillance.
Show threadNick HeerMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb The DocumentCloud link here (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24515959-facebookmeta-class-action-discovery) and linked in the post has a relevant name but it’s concerning that Kentucky/YouTube viewers/elonmuskwhm case, not the Meta one.
Facebook/Meta class action discovery

Show thread@infosec_jcp 🐈🃏 done differentlyMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Show thread2xfoMar 26, 2024

@lorenzofb

"In 2019, Facebook shut down Onavo after a TechCrunch investigation revealed that Facebook had been secretly paying teenagers to use Onavo so the company could access all of their web activity."

Yikes!

Show threadLe Monolecte 😷🤬🐧 Mar 26, 2024

@lorenzofb

What a surprise !

(no)

Show threadintermobility_berlin 🌻🇪🇺Mar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb Doh! 🤡
Show threadInterpipes 💙Mar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb @malwaretech so.. onavo was, what, installing a trusted root cert initiated from a *regular appstore download* and able to MITM traffic that (presumably) wasn't protected by cert pinning? And the app store which is run so expediently and so expensively to "protect consumers" or whatever horseshit Apple has come out with in pursuit of trying to keep their 30% was ok with this, was it? o_O
Show threadJohn Skiles SkinnerMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb
So they *bought* a VPN company, presumably serving security-minded customers, so that they could transform that VPN into spyware? Yikes that's low
Show threadAlexander The 1stMar 27, 2024
@skiles @lorenzofb Doubly so, because this basically opens them up the government surveillance of their surveillance technology, and we're...back to why end-to-end encryption was a whole thing.
Show threadKevin Karhan Mar 27, 2024

@skiles @lorenzofb What do you expect from a #PRISM collaborator like #NSAbook / #StasiBook?

OFC they gonna do the shit that everyone accuses #ByteDance and then some in broad daylight!

Show threadMardochMar 26, 2024
@lorenzofb I don't see why we continue to allow this company to exist. They should be destroyed for the good of us all.
Show threadJustin FitzsimmonsMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb the details of this are WAY worse than what the headline suggests. And the headline is already very bad. Holy shit.
Show threadLurkieMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb the link to the document on that page seems to be from a different case
Show threadfelix (grayscale) 🐺Mar 27, 2024
@desttinghim @lorenzofb this seems to be the right doc
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.369872/gov.uscourts.cand.369872.735.0.pdf
Show threadfelix (grayscale) 🐺Mar 27, 2024
@desttinghim @lorenzofb It's unclear from the document and current reporting, but this was the "Facebook Research App" which used code from Onava. It wasn't the Onava VPN itself. There are a number of articles from 2019 when FRA was shut down, which talk about how the app asked the user to install a root certificate, and supposedly got informed consent from users for its aggressive snooping of their encrypted behavior.
Show threadKyle Memoir 🍉🐧Mar 27, 2024

@lorenzofb

Privacy is so yesterday.

Show threadParker HodgesMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb perhaps the project was to scrape and sell Snapchat texts to competitors and ... foreign espionage agencies?
Show threadBruce Heerssen Mar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb
Yet another reason to distrust Meta. If anyone thinks they aren't analyzing Whatsapp message traffic, well, I don't know what else to tell you.
Show threadLatte macchiato  Mar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb Now, I cant say I'm surprised, but I still want to firebomb Facebook for it.
Hard to imagine anyone being that brazen about it.
Show threadgaryMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb everybody upset when zuck does this but they just accept it from feds lol - kind of funny #behave
Show threadKye.br Mar 27, 2024
@gary_alderson @lorenzofb It's because we expect this from feds. It's literally in there job description. Facebook shouldn't be doing this. It's unexpected and horrifying.
Show threadgaryMar 28, 2024
@Kyebr @lorenzofb no the feds tread on the unholy alliance and psyop of respecting the constitution which is why they buy this infor from data brokers and fb in their spare time with black budget funds that are untraceable - it is an iceberg and will be a big story in 20 years when we have fiber and and vastly more secure comms. still a good reply - everybody is right here sort of from a fisa lawyer and moral perspective - kinda - which is why it is not such big or 'new' news #bb84 is complete
Show threadHyde 📷 🖋 Mar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb and some people still think we should let them on the #fediverse because they may act correctly ...
Show threadfatboy Mar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb fuxkin facebook
Show threadClément Boudereau🦀Mar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb 😅
Show threadmike morrisMar 27, 2024

@lorenzofb And is this the same company running a federated thing called Threads or something? The one that a large piece of the fediverse wants to "give a fair chance"?

Why, yes. Yes it is!

#threads #meta #fediverse

Show threadGreville ConstantineMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb I DIDN'T THINK ZUCKERBERG COULD BE CAPABLE OF THIS.😳
Show threadRichard BejtlichMar 27, 2024
@lorenzofb I wonder what Alex Stamos thinks of this?
Show threadsluggard   Mar 28, 2024
@lorenzofb nice job. Great read.