Facebook might be soon more known for its data breach than anything else. After Cambridge Analytica scandal erupted last March and Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s speech before the U.S Congress, Facebook has lost a lot of credibility lately – diminishing trust to its shareholders. 
The latest example? A new data breach among 50 millions of accounts in Europe. This could cost the company more than $1.6 billion, as the Internet giant might have to compensate data violation to each of its users.
While an independent Irish data regulator could put the company at risk, several top executives have already announced the suppression of their professional and personal accounts, severely deteriorating Facebook’s reputation. 

Access tokens granted all-access

On September 25th, Facebook published a press released explaining how  “attackers” – as Facebook name hackers – had the opportunity to get in the system.
Unlike Cambridge Analytica, this bug was a Facebook’s in-house one. Hackers managed to change the code in the page “View As”, and therefore stole information from 50 million accounts.
Facebook reaction was also immediate: the social network automatically logged out more than 90 million accounts as a preventive measure. However,  Ireland’s Data Protection Commission has demanded more explanation and suggested a press release was not enough, according to the Wall Street Journal.
In response, users have gathered and expressed their anger online. One Taiwanese hacker even promised to live-stream the deletion of Mark Zuckerberg’s account himself, according to Bloomberg. He was later on sued for hacking the social media.

Top executives resign, fearing reputation

While experts are predicting more breaches to come on the social network, Facebook is facing a tremendous increasing number of accounts deactivations. But also, an increasing number of resignations from top executives.
So far this year, at least seven top executives have left Facebook, after the several scandals happening among the network. While the company has pride itself for being a “family”, this turnover might show how fragile it is now.

It is time. #deletefacebook

— Brian Acton (@brianacton) March 20, 2018

Whatsapp Facebook-owned co-founder Jan Koum, ten-year Head of Communications Elliot Schrage, but also Facebook’s top lawyer Colin Stretch have announced their departure in the last few months.
Some of them even encouraged users to delete their accounts too, including Brian Acton and his hashtag #deletefacebook, that went viral on Twitter.

“The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads.

That sucks.”

– Jeffrey Hammerbacher (former Facebook Data Engineer)#DeleteFacebook

— Jason Ogle (@jasonogle) September 27, 2018

While the press releases showed no intention of suing the company, this might be the worst publicity Facebook could have after worldwide scandals.

Facebook extends deletion grace period

And while more and more users are thinking of leaving the network – especially those whose information were compromised – Facebook announced yesterday that it would extend its accounts deletion grace period from 14 to 30 days, making it harder for users to leave the social media.
From now on, it will take up to 90 days for a user to delete its account and receiving all the data it has gathered over the years.
Numerous influencers and users have complained about this new regulation, aimed, according to many experts, to keep users hooked on the network, as Facebook has increased its advertising-focused strategy.