After massive Facebook hack, Taiwanese hacker cancels plan to delete Zuckerberg profile

在大規模的Facebook駭客攻擊後，台灣駭客取消刪除祖柏克格帳號計劃

Facebook user data for over 50 million users has been compromised according to Facebook


TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Facebook reported a massive hack on Friday Sept. 28, only a day after a Taiwanese hacker claimed he was preparing to live stream the hacking and deletion of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s personal account on the platform.

After Facebook announced the hack, which has reportedly compromised the data of some 50 million users, the somewhat prominent Taiwanese hacker, Chang Chi-yuan, has since reportedly canceled his plans to target Mark Zuckerberg.

According to Business Insider, Facebook representatives have stated that they do not believe the breach of user data is related to Chang.

Originally Chang stated he would live stream the hack of Zuckerberg’s Facebook page on his own account in a FB event scheduled for 6:00 p.m. Sunday evening.

The Verge posted a quote from Chang on the planned live stream of the hack in the early morning Sept. 29 (Taiwan time). "I am canceling my live feed, I have reported the bug to Facebook and I will show proof when I get bounty from Facebook."


The picture for Chang Chi-yuan's planned FB event (Image from Chang's FB)

The bug that Chang claims to have reported may be linked to the cyber attack and breach of user data. Business Insider says the attack appears to be one of the most significant in Facebook’s history.

After news of the attack shares dropped 3 percent for the company by midday Friday. News of the compromised user data was reportedly discovered on Tuesday, and Facebook is looking into whether or not, and how, the attackers abused the compromised accounts' data.

Business Insider reports that the security flaw which the hackers were able to exploit was related to the “View As” feature on the platform, which allows users to view their own accounts as another person would see them.

"This allowed them to steal Facebook access tokens which they could then use to take over people’s accounts," said Facebook’s VP of Product Management Guy Rosen. The access tokens are what allow people to remain logged in on computers without reentering login and password info for each visit to the site.

Chang may have discovered information on the security flaw through online hacking forums after the cyber attack on Facebook had already occurred, and sought to draw public attention by demonstrating the flaw to Facebook.

The company's announcement of the cyber attack on Friday made that unnecessary.