Instagram has reportedly been storing copies of deleted private messages and photos on its servers even when the users deleted the information from their accounts. The platform acknowledged the security mistake and awarded the researcher who discovered the flaw $6,000 for finding the bug. The researcher, Saugat Pokharel, found the issue when he downloaded his old data from Instagram. Pokharel then found that the information re-downloaded included photos and private messages that he had previously deleted.
This alerted Pohkarel to the problem, and after investigating based upon his suspicions he found the flaw. Although Pokharel reported the problem in October of 2019 to Instagram through its bug bounty program, the bug wasn’t fixed until earlier this month. The bug lied in a feature launched by the social media platform in 2018.
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