A thief in November swiped a bag from a Facebook employee’s vehicle that contained private information of more than 30,000 of the tech company’s employees, Bloomberg reported Friday.
The stolen hard drives included the bank account numbers and portions of employees’ social security numbers, among other highly private information, Facebook told staff members Friday, the report noted. The employee who was robbed did not have authority to carry the hard drives out of the office.
“We worked with law enforcement as they investigated a recent car break-in and theft of an employee’s bag containing company equipment with employee payroll information stored on it,” a spokeswoman said, according to Bloomberg. “We have seen no evidence of abuse and believe this was a smash and grab crime rather than an attempt to steal employee information.”
The records were stolen on Nov. 17 but Facebook didn’t realize they were gone until on Nov. 20, Bloomberg reported, citing internal Facebook emails. Investigators confirmed nine days later, on Nov. 29, that the hard drives include payroll information for 29,000 employees who worked with the company in 2018.
Facebook Chairman and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies at a House Financial Services Committee hearing in Washington, U.S., October 23, 2019. REUTERS/Erin Scott
Facebook has not yet responded to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
Facebook has wrestled with accusations in the past pertaining to its handling of customers’ private information. Reports in June, for instance, suggest Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was aware of some potential abuses of private data. (RELATED: Facebook Disputes WSJ Report Suggesting Zuckerberg Was Possibly Aware Of Privacy Violations)
Zuckerberg raised issues with a third-party app that was capable of accessing Facebook users’ information regardless of their privacy settings and was thus aware there was a problem, The Wall Street Journal reported in June. The company “uncovered emails” that would show he knew of “problematic privacy practices,” the report noted.
A Facebook representative said at the time: “We have fully cooperated with the FTC’s investigation to date and provided tens of thousands of documents, emails and files.”
Facebook’s denial came as the company was preparing for a massive fine related to the social media giant’s handling of users’ private data ahead of the 2016 election.
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