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Facebook says nearly 50 million user accounts affected by security breach

FILE- In this May 1, 2018, file photo, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes the keynote speech at F8, Facebook's developer conference in San Jose, Calif. Facebook says it recently discovered a security breach affecting nearly 50 million user accounts. In a blog post, Friday, Sept. 28, the company says hackers exploited its "View As" feature, which lets people see what their profiles look like to someone else. Facebook says it has taken steps to fix the security problem and alerted law enforcement. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)
FILE- In this May 1, 2018, file photo, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes the keynote speech at F8, Facebook's developer conference in San Jose, Calif. Facebook says it recently discovered a security breach affecting nearly 50 million user accounts. In a blog post, Friday, Sept. 28, the company says hackers exploited its "View As" feature, which lets people see what their profiles look like to someone else. Facebook says it has taken steps to fix the security problem and alerted law enforcement. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File) FILE- In this May 1, 2018, file photo, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes the keynote speech at F8, Facebook's developer conference in San Jose, Calif. Facebook says it recently discovered a security breach affecting nearly 50 million user accounts. In a blog post, Friday, Sept. 28, the company says hackers exploited its "View As" feature, which lets people see what their profiles look like to someone else. Facebook says it has taken steps to fix the security problem and alerted law enforcement. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)

By Associated Press 4 min read

NEW YORK (AP) – Facebook reported a major security breach in which 50 million user accounts were accessed by unknown attackers.

In a blog post, the company says hackers exploited a bug that affected its “View As” feature, which lets people see what their profiles look like to someone else. That would let attackers steal “access tokens,” which are digital keys that Facebook uses to keep people logged in. Possession of those tokens would allow attackers to “seize control” of user accounts, Facebook said.

Specifically, from the “View As” feature, a bug somehow allowed a video uploader to appear for sending “happy birthday” messages, Guy Rosen, Facebook’s vice president of product management said. Another bug then created an access token that made Facebook think the hacker had legitimately signed in with the account being viewed.

“We haven’t yet been able to determine if there was specific targeting,” Rosen said in a call with reporters. “It does seem broad. And we don’t yet know who was behind these attacks and where they might be based.”

Facebook says it has taken steps to fix the security problem and alerted law enforcement.