Who can find a bug in Facebook! There is a huge reward stored for bug hunting in this social network. Taking another step towards a perfect social network, Facebook announced a bug reword program for the researchers who will get paid a fortune for reporting security bugs over the renowned social network.
Researchers need to follow the responsible disclosure policy of Facebook according to which they cannot disclose sensitive security information publically until the social networking site fixes it. And the amount they are paid for this is huge! A compensation of $500 and plus is set for these bug hunters. As stated by Joe Sullivan, the Chief security officer of Facebook, in his conference call with CNET, fixing a bug need not take more than a day. The security team of the company has regarded the compensation program as a nice means of offering incentive and appreciation to the study community which is always on its toes to keep Facebook secure and safe for its users. It is a good way of inspiring the work team of the company as well.
Prior to this compensation program, bug hunters used to receive recognition on Facebook’s Whitehat page and if they are fortunate- can get a job at the social network. Recently Facebook has hired Sony PlayStation 3 hacker and iPhone Jailbreaker George Hotz who works over the security concerns. Also, as stated by Alex, head of product security at Facebook, many of the finest engineers at the office of the social networking site are appointed here after they reported a security hole on the site. In the mean time, the company is opening passage for the security researchers for creating accounts for testing on Facebook. McGeehan and Rice said this will ensure that they are not violating the terms of use or affecting any other user on the site.
Facebook is not the first to launch a compensation program like this. Mozilla in 2004 launched a bug reward program and Google offers a bug reward program with compensations of $500 and more, even more than $3000 for searching a web security bug. Facebook has surely followed their footsteps.
In this way, Facebook in inspiring the research community to look at security issues with great attention in order to create a social network which is secure for its users and furthermore flawless!