Arun Kumar, a 20-yr old student from Kerela, became a millionaire after finding a vulnerability in Facebook code.
Arun is a young hacker who belongs to Kollam and studies computer engineering at the MES Institute of Technology and Management in Chathannoor. A program was initiated by Facebook in 2011 in which any person who finds flaws on the website would be rewarded.
Tech expert Arun Kumar discovered a critical vulnerability in Facebook Business Manager which would allow a hacker to take control over the Facebook page in less than 10 seconds.
Arun discovered the bug named Full Account Takeover, which allows anyone easy trespass into other people’s Facebook accounts without their knowledge or approval.
In a recent interview given to Times Of India, Arun said,
“It was during one of my usual searches that I found lookaside.facebook.com. After searching further, I found that the domain is affected by a malfunction named Full Account Takeover, in which a hacker could easily trespass into any Facebook account without the knowledge or approval of the owner in less than 10 minutes. Since the hacker would be able to manipulate the page of any Facebook user, the damage it would bring is beyond imagination”.
Young techie found a bug on 29 august and reported it to the security team of Facebook. One of the employees reverted to him on 30 august saying how his discovery helped them prevent a massive security breach.
The Facebook team fixed the bug on 6 September and mailed Arun thanking him and informed about their decision to award him.
Arun is an expert of finding bugs. Earlier also in April, facebook rewarded him with Rs 7 lakh for finding a vulnerability. Apart from facebook, he has also spotted many bugs in Google. He earned around Rs 30.85 lakh ($46,000) in the past three years for hunting down bugs.
Arun is the only Indian to be honored in the website’s hall of fame and is also awarded the tenth place in the Facebook’s hall of fame of the white hat hackers. Arun is one of the few who got the rare opportunity by facebook to attend a meeting with its security members at Las Vegas. Three other hackers from different countries were also invited to attend the same.
Arun is basically from of Mundakkal, Kollam, Kerela and belongs to a middle-class family. Arun’s father is a clerk with the state government and his mother is a homemaker. He is currently in the third year of engineering and wishes to use his award money to fund his higher education abroad.
We wish Arun all the good luck for his bright future and hope he makes India more proud in near future.