Among those at risk of hacking are human rights activists, journalists and officials.
The enhanced protection program Facebook Protect is available for 1.5 million accounts, of which 950 thousand have connected two-factor authentication, TechCrunch writes with reference to the company. By the end of 2021, the program will appear in 50 countries, including the USA, India and Portugal. In 2022, it will be available in other regions. The company wants the function to be used by everyone who has access to it, so it makes it mandatory for people who may be at particular risk — for example, human rights defenders, journalists and officials. The social network will block their access to accounts until they enable two-factor authentication. The company did not specify by what criteria accounts subject to hacking will be selected. According to our own data, when testing the enhanced protection program, two-factor authentication was enabled by more than 90% of users with a high risk of hacking. Facebook began in October to warn journalists about blocking for refusing to connect additional protection, and Russian journalists also received notifications. The company launched the Facebook Protect project in 2019. It was used in 2020 during the US presidential election to fight fakes.