Instagram rewards Jaipur student Rs 38 lakh

Jaipur: Instagram has rewarded a Jaipur student with 38 lakh for finding a bug and saving millions of Instagram accounts from being hacked. Neeraj Sharma reported a bug that let users change the thumbnail of their Instagram reels from any account without entering their login and password. The bug made Instagram accounts vulnerable to hackers who could have issued the thumbnail feature without using the login credentials.

Neeraj informed Meta about the bug on Instagram and Facebook back in January after he faced some issues with his Instagram account. The company acknowledged the issue and the company asked him to share a demo of the same. He later proved his report by showing a 5-minute demo in which he changed the thumbnail of a Reel without the account credentials. After conducting a thorough investigation, Facebook approved his report on May 11 and awarded him with a reward of $45,000, which when converted to Indian currency becomes Rs 38 lakh. Facebook also offered $4500 i.e Rs 3.6 lakh for delaying the reward by four months.

To enhance Facebook and Instagram security, Meta is running a Meta Bug Bounty program live for programmers. The company also rewards external programmers and researchers heavily if they find security vulnerabilities in Meta technologies and programs. “We recognize and reward security researchers who help us to keep people safe by reporting vulnerabilities in our products and services. Monetary bounties for such reports are entirely at Meta’s discretion, based on risk, impact, the number of vulnerable users, and other factors,” Meta’s bug bounty program policy reads.