Technological giants Apple and Meta (formerly Facebook Inc.) handed over user data to hackers who falsified warrants for urgent data requests, usually sent by the police. According to Bloomberg, cited by The Verge, the incident took place in the middle of last year, and the companies are said to have provided the hackers with IP addresses, phone numbers or physical addresses of users of their platforms, among other things.
Police representatives often request data from social platforms in connection with criminal investigations, which allows them to obtain informace about the owner of a particular online account. While these requests require a search warrant signed by a judge or processed in court, urgent requests (involving life-threatening situations) do not.
Gallery
As the website Krebs on Security points out in its recent report, fake urgent requests for data have become more and more common recently. During an attack, hackers must first gain access to the police department's email systems. They can then falsify an urgent request for data on behalf of a specific police officer, describing the possible danger of not immediately sending the requested data. According to the website, some hackers are selling access to government emails online for this purpose. The website adds that most of those sending these fake requests are minors.
You could be interested in
Meta a Apple they are not the only companies that have encountered this phenomenon. According to Bloomberg, the hackers also contacted Snap, the company behind the popular social network Snapchat. However, it is not clear if she complied with the false request.
