Facebook is having another snafu with user privacy on iOS devices it seems.
Users are reporting that, when opening a video within their app, that the phone’s camera also activates at the same time.
To prove this, several users on Twitter have recorded the phenomenon in action and, sure enough, there is a visible Facebook camera UI visible underneath them watching a video of some kind.
While it is getting almost passe to discuss Facebook and privacy concerns in the same sentence, it bears repeating for those of us out there that aren’t aware of the myriad of problems that slapping a camera on everything has produced. From laptops to smartphones, there are cameras everywhere now and they are all vulnerable to exploitation by nefarious actors.
That is the truth no matter what is going on in this case. Web designer Joshua Maddox recreated the problem across five different iPhones and documented his evidence on Twitter. Additionally, tech website CNet replicated the issue as well.
As Joshua Maddox points out, simply dragging down the current video screen reveals an active camera app behind it.
If that’s not unsettling enough, it apparently only happens if you’ve given the app permission to use your camera but, as many people are pointing out, that permission was never intended as a blanket usage right for whenever an app or its maker feels like using the camera.
Facebook VP Guy Rosen says that it sounds like a bug in the app, The Verge reports.
While Facebook fixes the issue, one quick fix is to revoke the app’s permission to use your camera. Naturally, that’s not very convenient for those of us that post a lot of media to Facebook from a smartphone but it’s the best we’ve got now.
Have you encountered this issue with the Facebook app? Let us know your experiences in the comments section below.
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