Facebook Messenger could be recording you with your own camera, taking photos and sending texts without your permission

Facebook has become such a familiar household name that when many of us were forced into downloading the messenger app onto our phones, we didn’t think to check out the terms and conditions.‘It’s Facebook,’ we might have thought. ‘If they were going to do anything weird and out there the media would have reported it straight away.’

Except we didn’t… well, not until a billion people had already downloaded the social media app.

One savvy Facebook user, Sam Fiorella, decided he would delve into the T&Cs, and what he found is pretty damn terrifying.

facebook messenger t&c's credit: facebook — Just some of the terms and conditions for the new Facebook app (Picture: HuffingtonPost/Facebook)

Apparently, Facebook can take photos, send texts and even record calls, all without your permission. Meaning you’ll have no control over what it’s doing behind the scenes whatsoever.

Even weirder, and perhaps even more unsettling, is that they can read personal data on your phone about both yourself and your contacts, and then pass the info on.

Bit scary, huh?

It’s worth noting that many apps contain Ts&Cs like these, but rarely, if ever, have a need to use them.

Still, Sam shared a list of the worst offending Ts&Cs and, while there is the ability to fiddle around yourself to some extent with the security settings, it’s still slightly sinister.