back to article SHOW ME the MONEY: Payment code spied in Facebook Messenger

Peer-to-Peer (P2P) payments code has been spotted in Facebook's Messenger app by Andrew Aude, a Stanford student: but the massive advertising company has refused to confirm it's working on payments technology. "We don’t comment on rumour or speculation," a spokesman at the free content ad network told The Register when quizzed …

  1. chivo243 Silver badge
    Paris Hilton

    If you...

    I'll send you a couple of bucks.... you fill in the blank, and let your imagination run wild, as if it already hasn't?!

  2. Proud Father
    Facepalm

    Scary idea.

    The lads from Lagos can already see the possibilities.

    1. chivo243 Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Re: Scary idea.

      I was really thinking of those hot chicks with out real jobs trying to make a few bucks for a "Like"! Always a happy ending.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Or you give them cash next time you see them or you do a funds transfer between banks which won't incurr any FB handling fees..

  4. Ben Bonsall

    CSRFF- Cross Site Request For Funds...

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    So it's going to be yet another way to make money...

    Because FerengiBook will probably wan't a cut for the privilege...

    (Not to mention getting their hands on your precious credit-card details !)

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Facebook tentacles in your bankbook

    After all, what could possibly go wrong with this?

  7. DJV Silver badge
    Unhappy

    How to use the Facebook Messenger app

    My experience on both iPad and Android:

    1) Tried the separate messenger once they'd ripped the usable one out of the main app.

    2) Looked at the excessive privacy access it wanted.

    3) Raised my eyebrows in a correspondly excessive manner.

    4) Deleted it.

    5) Reverted to using web browser.

    1. ukgnome

      Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

      Then you need to understand how apps work.

      There isn't anything sinister in the permissions.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

        Did you forget the irony tags?

        Explain why fb chat should need to know who is calling me.

        1. ukgnome

          Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

          It doesn't know who's calling you, but it does recognise when your phones in use.

          This can be used for several reason, the main reason is for when you use the integrated phone feature, so that you can phone your friend from the app.

          If your friend has trusted their number to FB then you can buzz them from the app.

          these permissions are the same or very similar to most other messaging apps, including WhatsApp, Snapchat and Instagram.

          1. Graham Marsden

            @ukgnome - Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

            It isn't what they do with the permissions *now*, it's what they *can* do with them in the future which is what concerns people.

            Given the lack of granularity in Android permissions (which are pretty much all or nothing), I'd certainly prefer "nothing" in cases like this given the way FB considers you to be the product.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

            But the permission they are asking for means that they CAN get that information without needing to request it in future. It might be that Android permissions are too broad but it still allows FB to run rampant over your phone and your personal data.

            1. ukgnome
              Alert

              Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

              WOW - do all you down voters work on a helpdesk?

              I find your lack of knowledge quite incredible, and some of your opinions are backward to say the least.

              Apps on phones need to know what the device is doing for a start.

              If it's to use any function of the phone then it needs access to them. A developer doesn't need to write a service for handling text messages when the phone OS already has that, they don't need to write a service to launch the dialler, attach photo's operate the camera etc etc.

              However, I understand why some of you are scared, worried, afraid. The simple thing for you to do is grab some tin foil and fashion a hat. Maybe wrap your phone in some and think of a different career choice. I hear the golden arches are recruiting.

              1. Graham Marsden
                Facepalm

                @ukgnome - Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

                > Apps on phones need to know what the device is doing for a start.

                Can you not see the difference between knowing if the phone owner is making a call and knowing *who* the owner is calling?

                The former I (probably) don't have an issue with. The latter I do have an issue with. The problem is that *I* don't get the choice if I can only grant an "all or nothing" permission.

      2. Just Enough

        Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

        "There isn't anything sinister in the permissions."

        Are you quoting that directly from the T&C?

        Perhaps there isn't, for now. But facebook has a bit of a history of changing the rules whenever it suits them, without telling their users. So once you've granted permission for "nothing sinister" it may come as a bit of a shock when the next, further, intrusion into your life is also, by facebook's reckoning, "nothing sinister".

        I'd rather be in charge of where the line is drawn, and stick to it.

        1. chivo243 Silver badge
          Joke

          Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

          @Just Enough

          Reminds me of going on dates as a teenager. I've got my date in the back seat of my old man's car, and we are talking a bit, a little kissing, then I try for a little more, get my hand slapped trying to feel her up, try again later and get a bit further, by midnight we were both searching for our underpants under the seat...

          I guess we both knew where the lines were, but FB doesn't......

      3. Lamont Cranston
        Flame

        Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

        Excessive permissions seem to be the standard, but there's usually a good reason for having call access (making calls from the app, as has been mentioned above). I got more cross with the default behaviour of facebook messenger, where it splurts "chat heads" all over the screen, obscuring anything and everything. Shitty, shitty app that did not need to be a standalone entity.

      4. Kanhef

        Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

        I can understand the need for some of the permissions, such as access to the camera and storage so you can post photos. But I'd love to see their explanation for why it needs to be able to modify contact information, read text messages, change network connections, or modify battery information.

      5. hold2ransom

        Re: How to use the Facebook Messenger app

        Says who?

  8. codebeard

    It's exactly this kind of thing which made me uninstall the Facebook app (I never even touched Messenger with the permissions it wanted) and I'm now very happy with the surprisingly faster and more fully-featured "home screen link to facebook dot com".

  9. Jason 41

    It's things like this

    All these apps and doohickey's and wotnoty widgets sometimes make me wonder if I'm missing out on something amazing since I'm not on Facebook (which is obviously why I read the articles)

    Then I think 'meh'

    1. Lamont Cranston

      Re: It's things like this

      It's always important to comment on articles like this, so that you can register your disinterest.

  10. Mark 85

    "Free Content Ad Network"??? When did that change? I thought it was a "content free ad network".

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Used just as much as Facebook "gifts", no doubt

    Has anyone ever actually sent their friend a "gift" for their birthday like Facebook encourages? Thought not.

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