Facebook: In 2013, Facebook bought an Israeli company Onavo for about $ 120 million. At that time, this app was promoted as a trusted VPN, which was aimed at safety of users’ privacy, data saving and securing online activities. But the reality was something else. As soon as he installed Onavo in his phone, the user inadvertently gives Facebook full exemption to monitor every activity of his mobile, which apps were opened, how long it was used, which website was visited and when it was. More than 3.3 crore people downloaded the app thinking that they were saving their privacy but actually they were giving Facebook directly to their personal data.

The competition started to be identified through data espionage

According to reports from public court documents, Facebook used Onavo to find out which apps are becoming increasingly popular. Facebook was eyeing Houseparty, Amazon, YouTube and especially Snapchat. By collecting the detailed use data of these apps, Facebook decides which company can compete with it later.

Snapchat became the biggest target

By 2016, Snapchat’s popularity was growing rapidly. But since his traffic was encrypted, Facebook could not directly see what the users are doing in it. In response, Facebook started a secret mission Project Ghostbusters.

Under this project, Facebook engineers prepared a custom code based on Onavo. It installed a root certificate in the user’s phone. Facebook then created fake certificates like Snapchat server so that its traffic can be designed. Its purpose was to understand the inside activity of the user and to make a product or business strategy based on the same.

Could not buy Snapchat then stole the feature

When Facebook offered to buy Snapchat for $ 3 billion and SNAP’s CEO Evan Spiegel refused, Facebook launched Instagram stories instead of going to the backfoot, the right feature that was the hallmark of Snapchat.

It was not just a case of copy-paste, but shows how Facebook used to recognize the emerging threat using data monitoring and keeps it a hold on the market.

Ban on Onavo but Facebook was ready

In 2018, Apple removed Onavo from the App Store due to violation of data privacy rules. After this, Facebook started the Facebook Research App in the name of Project Atlas. This time the company installed this app by paying up to $ 20 a month to users (some were only 13 years old) so that they could track the user data again. When Apple caught this, she canceled Facebook’s Enterprise Certificate, which stopped working on many Facebook’s internal apps on iOS.

Finally investigative agencies came into action

In 2020, the Australian Consumer Commission (ACC) filed a case on Facebook (now META), stating that the company misled people through Onavo about their data. In 2023, Meta’s subsidiaries were fined a total of $ 2 crore Australian dollars, it was one of the rare legal action against tech companies.

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