Reportedly, Meta has fired or punished more than two dozen employees for hijacking Facebook and Instagram accounts in the last twelve months. As per the news published by The Wall Street Journal, some guilty employees used Meta’s account recovery software, “Oops” (Online Operations) and even took bribes worth thousands of dollars from those seeking access.
Meta spokesman Andy Stone was quoted as saying,
“Individuals selling fraudulent services are always targeting online platforms, including ours, and adapting their tactics in response to the detection methods that are commonly used across the industry.”
He further added, “The company will keep taking appropriate action against those involved in these kinds of schemes.”
On losing access to their accounts, people frequently tried automated procedures for resetting their accounts or attempted to contact employees at Meta by phone or email, which, according to many users, is reported to be frequently unsuccessful. Some of those users were able to avail the assistance of Meta personnel and subcontractors by completing a form through the Oops channel.
According to the report, the usage of Oops, an acronym for Online Operations, has risen along with the number of employees in spite of being somewhat restricted to special cases, such as friends, family, business partners, and public figures, etc. The report further stated that in 2020, the channel serviced about 50,270 tasks, up from 22,000 tasks in 2017.
