Some Snapchat Employees Abused Their Position To Spy On Users

The problem with online services is that your data is at the mercy of the company controlling the service. For the most part, many of us assume that there are safeguards in place to prevent access to our personal data, but unfortunately, that isn’t always the case. In a report from Motherboard, it has been found that some Snapchat employees had abused their position to spy on users.

The report, who cites former employees as their sources, claim that several Snapchat employees abused their access a few years ago. According to them, Snapchat has some internal tools that allow employees to access user information, such as their location, saved Snaps, and other personal information.

One of the tools, dubbed SnapLion, was developed so that Snap could access user information should there ever be a request from law enforcement. This makes sense as we’re sure that plenty of other companies have ways of accessing user information in such instances as well, but in this case, the report claims that some employees abused it.

In a statement provided to Motherboard, Snap said, “Protecting privacy is paramount at Snap. We keep very little user data, and we have robust policies and controls to limit internal access to the data we do have. Unauthorized access of any kind is a clear violation of the company’s standards of business conduct and, if detected, results in immediate termination.”

Tyler Lee
Categories: General
Tags: Legal, Privacy, snap, Snapchat