Facebook alters search function

FACEBOOK has removed the ability to search for people via their mobile number or email after admitting “most” of its two billion users could have had their information collected.

Previously, users could choose in their settings to allow others to find them via their contact details.

But in a blog post, Facebook said “malicious actors” had “abused these features to scrape public information” from the platform.

“Given the scale and sophistication of the activity we’ve seen, we believe most people on Facebook could have had their public profile scraped in this way,” said the company’s chief technology officer Mike Schroepfer.

“We have now disabled this feature. We’re also making changes to account recovery to reduce the risk of scraping.”

After it was revealed that 87 million users could have been affected by the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg admitted: “I would assume if you had that setting turned on that someone at some point has accessed your public information in some way.”

Previous estimates had suggested 50 million users were at risk, but as Mr Zuckerberg spoke, Cambridge Analytica claimed on Twitter that “no more than 30 million” individuals saw their data accessed.

The company also tweeted: “When Facebook contacted us to let us know the data had been improperly obtained, we immediately deleted the raw data from our file server, and began the process of searching for and removing any of its derivatives in our system.”

Mr Zuckerberg said that the 87 million figure, buried near the bottom of a Facebook blog post, was “the maximum number” thought possible, and admitted “we don’t actually know” the true total that were affected.

He admitted that Facebook “didn’t do enough” to protect its users and promised that the company was now committed to taking more responsibility for keeping people’s data safe.

“We didn’t take a broad enough view of what our responsibility is,” he said.

“That was a huge mistake. It was my mistake.”

Asked by a journalist if he still thought he was the best person to lead Facebook forward, Mr Zuckerberg said “yes”.

He added: “I think life is about learning from your mistakes and working out what you need to do to move forward.”

Mark Zuckerberg