Thousands of Facebook users warned over network of ‘spies for hire’ that snoop on your account

FACEBOOK'S owner is alerting thousands of users that their accounts have been attacked by spies.

Meta has sounded the alarm to 50,000 people on Facebook and Instagram targetted by "cyber mercenaries".

Seven "spy-for-hire" groups based in Israel, China, India, and North Macedonia have been foiled by the company.

Agents snooped on victims located in more than 100 countries on behalf of shady clients, Meta said.

They worked on gathering intelligence, manipulating devices and compromising accounts across the internet.

Often they claim to only have it in for criminals and terrorists.

But a months-long investigation has shown otherwise.

The hit list largely focused on journalists, critics of authoritarian regimes, families of opposition, and human rights activists.

"These companies are part of a sprawling industry that provides intrusive software tools and surveillance services indiscriminately to any customer - regardless of who they target or the human rights abuses they might enable," Meta said.

"This industry “democratises” these threats, making them available to government and non-government groups that otherwise wouldn’t have these capabilities."

Those affected are presented with a warning message when they login.

"We believe that a sophisticated attacker may be targeting your Facebook account," it reads.

"Be cautious when accepting friend requests and interacting with people you don't know."

Meta published a more detailed report exposing how the spies operate.

It names the companies allegedly involved, including Cobwebs Technologies, Cognyte, Black Cube, and Bluehawk CI based in Israel.

BellTroX in India, Cytrox in North Macedonia and an unknown entity in China.

In other news, Pornhub has exposed what horny Americans and Brits have been looking for in the past year - and there's a new favourite in town.

Apple Music is taking on Spotify with a new half price plan with a twist.

And Snapchat has revealed it has given away a whopping $250million (£189million) to its creators over the last year.

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