Alexander Solonchenko, a Ukrainian national, has been sued by Facebook for scraping data from more than 178 million users.
Facebook takes legal action against Ukrainian programmer
According to Engadget, Solonchenko reportedly utilized Messenger’s contact import feature with an automated software that impersonated Android devices.
He fed Facebook with millions of phone numbers and collected data whenever the website responded to inquiries about accounts with phone numbers.
The hacker allegedly ran the operation between January 2018 and September 2019. After he used his forum username and contact information on job and email boards, Solonchenko was found by Facebook.
The hacker also scraped data from other targets, including a Ukrainian bank, according to Facebook.
