Facebook glitch exposes user’s entire phone gallery in accidental post

A Helsinki woman intended to share just nine photos on Facebook, but the app instead published her entire phone gallery of over 4,100 images, Finnish public broadcaster Yle reports.

Marja Hjelt, a data specialist at Finland’s National Library, attempted to post selected photos from a weekend trip on Sunday. After tagging two friends in the update, she discovered that Facebook had uploaded her complete phone gallery—despite her never granting the app permission to access all images.

Hjelt did not see the erroneous post herself, but a friend alerted her after noticing the massive upload, dated June 14, 2012, containing thousands of photos. A second friend confirmed seeing only the intended nine-image post, suggesting the glitch affected visibility inconsistently.

Even after Hjelt deleted the correct post and cleared it from Facebook’s activity log, the unintended gallery briefly reappeared for some users. She described the incident as a “serious data security risk” and admitted hesitancy about future Facebook use.

Hjelt’s OnePlus Nord phone, running an up-to-date Android system, held no sensitive images, but she stressed that many photos were never meant for public sharing. Meta, Facebook’s parent company, did not respond to Yle’s request for comment.