Facebook Bug Accesses iPhone's Camera While Users Scroll Through News Feed

Facebook is rolling out a fix after iPhone users noticed that the app was turning on their camera while they were scrolling through their news feed. The bug was initially discovered by Joshua Maddux, who shared information about the disturbing find on Twitter.

Found a @facebook#security & #privacy issue. When the app is open it actively uses the camera. I found a bug in the app that lets you see the camera open behind your feed. Note that I had the camera pointed at the carpet.

Facebook confirmed the bug and said that there is no evidence that the camera was transmitting data to Facebook while it was activated. The bug only appears to impact devices running the latest version of iOS. It is not affecting people with Android phones, or those who are still using iOS 12.

"We recently discovered our iOS app incorrectly launched in landscape," Guy Rosen, Facebook's Vice President of Integrity, said. "In fixing that last week in v246 we inadvertently introduced a bug where the app partially navigates to the camera screen when a photo is tapped. We have no evidence of photos/videos uploaded due to this."

Rosen explained that the camera was in preview mode and was not streaming video in the background. He said that Facebook engineers have fixed the bug, and the fix has been pushed to the Apple Store. 

Photo: Getty Images