Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 172 posts

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#21

Post by quantumpotato_ »

beat wrote: post #20
jack-r-abbit wrote: post #5

I don't really understand what significance there is in stating that he is "unemployed." Does that somehow make his actions better/worse or the "hack" more/less tolerable?

You're starting to see the fnords. Stop that! Look over there, a celebrity is having marital problems! A pretty young blonde woman is missing! Journalism is always fair and balanced. They would never, ever use potentially biasing words to suggest that you favor the big corporation over the individual.

I think it was done to give credence to the web-developers lack of "corporatism", to show an "underdog" narrative. Sort of like "homeless man discovers flaw in millionaire's mansion security".. he's so badass he doesn't need a home, or a job, to be good at what he does.

I think. It's gotten nearly impossible to tell w/ modern journalism.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#22

Post by [deleted] »

cliveowen wrote: post #18
jzelinskie wrote: post #6

Why don't people just send things in their native language? If the platform for communication is serious (like a place to report security vulnerabilities), I would imagine they would spend the time/money to get a real translation if one was needed. Even Google Translate probably could've done a better job than this guy's original report.

There's no excuse for not knowing the English language, first as a 21 century citizen and secondly as a web developer.

[deleted]

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#23

Post by ethanbond »

short_circut wrote: post #7
chrisacky wrote: post #2

Although this is blogspam, it's a blogspam that I can actually support... This is being covered a lot more widely because FB didn't just pay the guy. I know it wasn't about money for FB, but this is easily done a lot more damage then they would have expected and because of their inadequate handling of a single bug report, I can only feel satisfied as I think this will go down as a good case study of how not to be so…

Dismissive and ignored? Did you read what he submitted to them? It made no sense. He vaguely stated that there was a bug and his education. His bug report was nonsensical. I am not even slightly surprised they ignored it. And he violated the TOS before he even ever tried to post to Zuckerberg's wall.

Not figuring out a way to communicate with someone clearly having difficulty communicating is dismissive.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#25

Post by jack-r-abbit »

beat wrote: post #20
jack-r-abbit wrote: post #5

I don't really understand what significance there is in stating that he is "unemployed." Does that somehow make his actions better/worse or the "hack" more/less tolerable?

You're starting to see the fnords. Stop that! Look over there, a celebrity is having marital problems! A pretty young blonde woman is missing! Journalism is always fair and balanced. They would never, ever use potentially biasing words to suggest that you favor the big corporation over the individual.

Got it. "Down on his luck web developer, just trying to make a living helping people, gets screwed out of $5k bounty for reporting a Facebook bug. News at 11."

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#26

Post by arnarbi »

> Shreateh reports he will not, however, receive a bounty for his work — per an e-mail from Facebook, he violated the terms of the program when he hacked Zuckerberg’s account.

I think this is wrong. He posted on Sarah Godin's wall first before making any report, very clearly breaking the rules FB sets up for its whitehat program. They offer a way to create test accounts for exactly this. Posting on Mark Zuckerberg's wall has nothing to do with it.

As far as I'm concerned. FB's only mistake here was to brush him off instead of asking for further information from the initial report. Hardly newsworthy.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#27

Post by mcphilip »

cliveowen wrote: post #18
jzelinskie wrote: post #6

Why don't people just send things in their native language? If the platform for communication is serious (like a place to report security vulnerabilities), I would imagine they would spend the time/money to get a real translation if one was needed. Even Google Translate probably could've done a better job than this guy's original report.

There's no excuse for not knowing the English language, first as a 21 century citizen and secondly as a web developer.

I downvoted you and am leaving this comment in hopes that those reading this thread don't get the impression that the entire HN community supports such a despicable outlook. I, for one, am grateful for all of the many important contributions to furthering computer science and its associated industries by non english speaking individuals.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#28

Post by zobzu »

short_circut wrote: post #7
chrisacky wrote: post #2

Although this is blogspam, it's a blogspam that I can actually support... This is being covered a lot more widely because FB didn't just pay the guy. I know it wasn't about money for FB, but this is easily done a lot more damage then they would have expected and because of their inadequate handling of a single bug report, I can only feel satisfied as I think this will go down as a good case study of how not to be so…

Dismissive and ignored? Did you read what he submitted to them? It made no sense. He vaguely stated that there was a bug and his education. His bug report was nonsensical. I am not even slightly surprised they ignored it. And he violated the TOS before he even ever tried to post to Zuckerberg's wall.

The fact that hes not english native and that communication seems hard for him does not mean that:

- he did not do all this in good faith. it seems like he genuinely did. Sure there are TOS. But given his english, do you really think he understood them? Of course not. Good faith is a higher morale value (even thus Americans are pretty much used to "if it passed as law/text, morale values are irrelevant, cuz lawyers+money is all that matters)

- $500 is less than peanuts for FB. Finding these bugs, even if they have to read into the guy's submission more than usual, is critical for FB. Refusing the bounty means that next time it'll be left unfixed and the bad guys will probably get it instead.

All in all, FB's not wrong per say, but it's still a bad move from FB, morally and PR-wise.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#29

Post by JangoSteve »

diminoten wrote: post #12

The Facebook team should have taken better care of this, but the guy should have used one of the test accounts, or created a test account to demonstrate this, rather than fuck with someone else's private Facebook account. Very bad form.

I agree. Why not create a test account and post to his own wall?

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page was hacked by an unemployed web developer

#30

Post by raverbashing »

cliveowen wrote: post #18
jzelinskie wrote: post #6

Why don't people just send things in their native language? If the platform for communication is serious (like a place to report security vulnerabilities), I would imagine they would spend the time/money to get a real translation if one was needed. Even Google Translate probably could've done a better job than this guy's original report.

There's no excuse for not knowing the English language, first as a 21 century citizen and secondly as a web developer.

Yes, but

Not everybody has access to good material and resources. Yes, the internet made this much easier. But it may be still difficult to "bootstrap" it

English may be more difficult depending on your mother tongue

It is frustrating when you want to say something in another language and even if you use Google Translate you're still not 100% sure.

So I think he should have tried harder, but at the same time, it may be difficult for some people.

Post reply on HN