It was recently reported how Snapchat ran into a PR disaster when the phone numbers and usernames of its 4.6 million users were leaked online. The company has now apologized, offering an opt-out option to avoid a similar debacle in the future.
The whole thing started from Snapchat’s ‘Find Friends’ feature. This feature essentially asks users to provide their phone numbers if they want to find other friends using the popular app. According to Snapchat, someone was able to abuse the app’s API to gain access to this data, which was then leaked online.
But what really aggravated things was the company’s response to the entire episode. From outright denial to mild acceptance and finally an apology, Snapchat took a whole lot of time to do what was right. This is the first time Snapchat has formally apologized over the whole thing.
Along with the apology, Snapchat has also announced that it is rolling out an opt-out feature for those who have been using the ‘Find Friends’ feature. All you need to do to opt out of this particular feature is go to the Settings page and tap ‘Mobile#.’
Moreover, if a Snapchat user tries to utilize the ‘Find Friends’ feature, the app would now verify his phone number first. This, the company hopes, will help mitigate the possible ways through which its API could be abused. While it isn’t clear how the app will verify the phone number, the most popular and secure way of doing so is to send a text containing a code to the provided phone number.
Source: Snapchat
Courtesy: The Verge
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