Facebook recently patched a bug in its systems that let anyone check if you’re a part of a certain group. Usually, if you’re part of a group, you can check out fellow members’ profiles. …

Facebook recently patched two bugs in its systems that let a non-member check if youre a part of a certain group and draw up a list of members from the same city.
Usually, if youre part of a group, you can check out fellow members profiles. But its not possible when youre not part of it especially when the group is private.
Security researcher Mohamed Shariff found a pair of bugs that allowed non-members to check group members using queries in graphql, a query language developed by Facebook. The first vulnerability was that attackers can see members of a group with the same city or the same university. And the second bug allowed a non-member to check if a person is part of a group.
Shariff reported this bug to the company in August. A Facebook spokesperson said that the bug was patched and didnt affect private groups that were hidden.
We found and quickly fixed a bug affecting visible private groups, allowing someone outside of that group to see if someone else was a member of it. The issue did not affect private groups that were hidden. 
With this info, attackers with malicious intent could target people that are part of a certain private group and live in the same city as them. Or they could also build up a persons profile using the private groups theyre part of to map their interests, and sell that info to a third party. This fix couldnt come soon enough.
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