BOSTON ― A Harvard University student says he lost his internship at Facebook after he launched a browser application from his dorm room that exploited privacy flaws on the company’s mobile messenger.
Aran Khanna’s app ― called Marauder’s Map in tribute to the Harry Potter books ― showed that users of Facebook Messenger could pinpoint the exact locations of people they were talking to.
He told Boston.com he created the app to show the consequences of unintentionally sharing data and thought he was doing a public service.
“I didn’t write the program to be malicious,” he said.
Khanna launched the app from his dorm room in May and said 85,000 people downloaded it.
Days later, Facebook asked Khanna to disable it. A week after that, Facebook released a Messenger app update addressing the flaw.
Facebook spokesman Matt Steinfeld said the company had been working on a Messenger update months before it became aware of Khanna’s app.
