It's a bad week for Mark Zuckerberg and personal security. Having seen his Twitter and Pinterest account hacked over the weekend, it's now emerged that Facebook Messenger has been compromised by malicious hackers.
The latest Facebook Messenger security flaw, discovered by online security company Check Point Software Technologies, allowed a malicious user to alter what was said in messages that had been sent.
Instead of calling your partner names or sending inappropriate chats to your ex, however, the hacker changed links sent in Messenger conversations to redirect to downloads of malware packages.
The security weakness, discovered last month and since fixed by Facebook, allowed the nefarious user to alter message content after discovering a message's unique "message_id" identifier.
"By exploiting this vulnerability, cyber-criminals could change a whole chat thread without the victim realising," Oded Vanunu, Head of Products and Vulnerability Research at Check Point, said in a blog post.
"The hacker could implement automation techniques to continually outsmart security measures for long-term chat alterations."
Far from the first time Facebook has been hit by hackers, back in April, usernames and passwords were pinched from Facebook's servers.
Fortunately, on that occasion, there was no malicious intent, with the hacker simply telling Facebook there was an issue with its security measures.
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