Instagram: We will pay up to $1m USD to any hacker who can pop us through bugs in our shit. Hacker: Ok I hacked you, lets roll. Instagram: J/K also calling your boss to rat on you.

[sonatine]

http://exfiltrated.com/research-Instagram-RCE.php

tl;dr sorta:

Instagram has a 'bug bounty' program where Information Security types submit exploitable bugs in their webapps, servers, etc and Instagram pays out an amount of money depending on the severity of the bug. Instagram, who remember is owned by Facebook, threw down the gauntlet and said 'Yeah if someone finds a million dollar bug, we are paying a million dollars!'

And that money went largely unclaimed because Instagram and Facebook have excellent InfoSec teams generally and tend not to fuck up too badly. Until someone put together a string of bad configuration decisions on a forgotten server and managed to root it, then put together a dossier on the hows and whys and whens to claim his cool mil, or perhaps more realistically 20-50k USD which is the going rate for this sort of thing.

Instagram pays $2500 for one element of the compromise then starts clutching pearls when the guys like "Maybe you dont understand; these are your weak as fuck admin passwords, here is where you store your customer data which I now have access to, whats the deal?"

And Instagram basically said that the security research violated some very dodgy and questionable criteria for the bug bounty program regarding avoiding customer data and a few other things and honestly this would be a huge black eye for them out the gate if it stopped there, but the dude shows up for work the next day and ends up having to answer for 'hacking Instagram' to his boss his bosses boss so on because the Chief Security Officer of Facebook Alex Stamos called them and demanded they account for their employees actions.

Pretty gross shit considering if this guy had simply bundled up everything he got off that hack, he could have sold it on Darkweb for 6 figs and probably knocked 50% off Instagram's value in the process.

Oh and almost certainly cost Alex Stamos his job.

Non-zero odds that the usual elements are going to be trying to do just that to prove a point btw.

[Dan Druff]

I want you to thank me for modifying vBulletin to where the thread title can be really, really, long.

[Dan Druff]

Reminds me of this story: http://pokerfraudalert.com/forum/sho...ith-215-reward

Russian player finds a bug in Pokerstars' FPP awarding which is costing the site $7000-$8000 per month. Reports it to them.

Bug had existed for months without detection.

Russian asks for a $750 smartphone from the Pokerstars store as a reward.

Pokerstars LOLs at him and gives him a $215 tourney ticket, and refuses to compensate him further.

No good deed goes unpunished.

[John Stamos]

I will talk to Alex at Christmas dinner about this

[TheXFactor]

The kids who owned Instagram probably thought that they made a great deal when they sold the company for $1 Billion.

Well, they didn't. They got fucked by Mark Zuckerberg.

Instagram would easily be worth about $30 Billion right now if they didn't sell out.
This is what happens when you have no vision and no balls.

Snapchat has a valuation of about $25 Billion. They made $3 million in revenue in 2014 and burned through over $150 million of investors money. I wouldn't be surprised if Snapchat goes under soon because they don't know what the fuck they are doing. Their whole business model is based on kids sexting messages to each other.

[sonatine]

The kids who owned Instagram probably thought that they made a great deal when they sold the company for $1 Billion.

Well, they didn't. They got fucked by Mark Zuckerberg.

Instagram would easily be worth about $30 Billion right now if they didn't sell out.
This is what happens when you have no vision and no balls.

Snapchat has a valuation of about $25 Billion. They made $3 million in revenue in 2014 and burned through over $150 million of investors money. I wouldn't be surprised if Snapchat goes under soon because they don't know what the fuck they are doing. Their whole business model is based on kids sexting messages to each other.

So why do you think Instagram isnt just another Snapchat waiting to collapse? Because a lot of VC corps think exactly that and cant believe how lucky they got that they didnt end up swallowing that Koolaid as well.

Twitter's another one, I've been saying short Twitter for like a year now.. its down 40% since then and its organic value is probably 65% less than what its currently trading at, providing they get acquired or can extort some more VC.

End of the day; if your company has no actual revenue stream, its not really worth much.

But regardless of what Instagram's real value is, they have $700m in their war chest and they told a dude who did 50k worth of work for them *at their invitation* to fuck himself and then for an encore fucked with his job?

Thats real bad form right there.

[ThisGuyisWhat]

Sonantine shorts stocks? LOLOLOL

[Brittney Griner's Clit]

Sonantine shorts stocks? LOLOLOL

More seminars. Less posting.

[Belly Buster]

The kids who owned Instagram probably thought that they made a great deal when they sold the company for $1 Billion.

Well, they didn't. They got fucked by Mark Zuckerberg.

Instagram would easily be worth about $30 Billion right now if they didn't sell out.
This is what happens when you have no vision and no balls.

Snapchat has a valuation of about $25 Billion. They made $3 million in revenue in 2014 and burned through over $150 million of investors money. I wouldn't be surprised if Snapchat goes under soon because they don't know what the fuck they are doing. Their whole business model is based on kids sexting messages to each other.

I'm sure they feel terrible while rubbing that $1bn into their titties.

[Belly Buster]

Sonantine shorts stocks? LOLOLOL

YourPointIsWhat?

[Daly]

The kids who owned Instagram probably thought that they made a great deal when they sold the company for $1 Billion.

Well, they didn't. They got fucked by Mark Zuckerberg.

Instagram would easily be worth about $30 Billion right now if they didn't sell out.
This is what happens when you have no vision and no balls.

Snapchat has a valuation of about $25 Billion. They made $3 million in revenue in 2014 and burned through over $150 million of investors money. I wouldn't be surprised if Snapchat goes under soon because they don't know what the fuck they are doing. Their whole business model is based on kids sexting messages to each other.

Well you say that and you are not wrong.

if you were a 20% owner you have $200M in the bank right now. That's $200M more than the owner of Pets.com.

There is a number where a 20-30-40 year old can buy a nice house the ocean and sit on his ass the rest of his life. We could argue what that number is but for the sake of argument let's aim high and say $10M.

So from your perspective he got fucked and should be a billionaire. If he's smart he's laughing at us from the beach.

[Sanlmar]

Twitter's another one, I've been saying short Twitter for like a year now.. its down 40% since then and its organic value is probably 65% less than what its currently trading at, providing they get acquired or can extort some more VC.

End of the day; if your company has no actual revenue stream, its not really worth much.

Shorting Twitter was like the 3rd stock mentioned in the FAO Stock Nerd thread. Any time your stuck for ideas, short Twitter.

Love the. FB short idea. Don't know if it worked that day. I am still alive.

Consider this a suicide note

Facebook FB

I am short and will add to that position on any kind of recovery from today's lows.

Earnings release after market close today. It's all fucking rosy. They have grand plans to monetize the ever lovin shit out of their users. It is expected to be a great report.

User growth slowing of course.

Basically, I feel all the good news is baked in. I also simply hate the social media sites - TWTR is a favorite short and has been very accommodating.

.

[MumblesBadly]

Twitter's another one, I've been saying short Twitter for like a year now.. its down 40% since then and its organic value is probably 65% less than what its currently trading at, providing they get acquired or can extort some more VC.

I can see how Twitter has cratered since April...



... But I tried to see how well the exact timing of your "short Twitter" recommendations here would have worked, but I can't find posts by you searching with those keywords. Would you identify them so we can analyze them?

Thanks!

[ThisGuyisWhat]

Why the backlash? Would be willing to bet my life Sonantine is not a long term profitable short seller. This forum is full of very sensitive people.

[Benford]

Facebook itself is valued at $294 billion. This is roughly $42 for every man, woman, and child on the planet Earth.

This would hypothetically include $42 for each of 770,000 sewer workers in India and those supported by them (LA Times)

Maybe the stock is slightly overvalued at this point?

[TheXFactor]

Well you say that and you are not wrong.

if you were a 20% owner you have $200M in the bank right now. That's $200M more than the owner of Pets.com.

There is a number where a 20-30-40 year old can buy a nice house the ocean and sit on his ass the rest of his life. We could argue what that number is but for the sake of argument let's aim high and say $10M.

So from your perspective he got fucked and should be a billionaire. If he's smart he's laughing at us from the beach.

Remember back then Instagram was going to be a huge competitor to Facebook?

That's the main reason Facebook bought them, Zuckerberg knew they were going to be a big success so he buys them and he eliminates another from the competition.

Instagram has gotten a lot more users since Facebook acquired them.
Many people have more "friends" on Instagram than any other site, like Dan Bilzerian.

Are the former owners of Instagram glad that Mark Zuckerberg bought them?
Fuck no. They know damn well they would be on to a valuation of $50 Billion right now.
Too late now, missed opportunities and zero balls.

As for Snapchat, it's a pure scam and they will fail big time. All of these valuations are phoney and there is a clause in the contract when they go through the rounds of funding that guarantees these investing VC companies their money back from other future funding rounds.

Once Snapchat fails completely and investors finally lose money. Then these major VC companies will stop investing in these bullshit tech companies that don't make money and never will.

[monsterj]

The kids who owned Instagram probably thought that they made a great deal when they sold the company for $1 Billion.

Well, they didn't. They got fucked by Mark Zuckerberg.

Instagram would easily be worth about $30 Billion right now if they didn't sell out.
This is what happens when you have no vision and no balls.

Snapchat has a valuation of about $25 Billion. They made $3 million in revenue in 2014 and burned through over $150 million of investors money. I wouldn't be surprised if Snapchat goes under soon because they don't know what the fuck they are doing. Their whole business model is based on kids sexting messages to each other.

So why do you think Instagram isnt just another Snapchat waiting to collapse? Because a lot of VC corps think exactly that and cant believe how lucky they got that they didnt end up swallowing that Koolaid as well.

Twitter's another one, I've been saying short Twitter for like a year now.. its down 40% since then and its organic value is probably 65% less than what its currently trading at, providing they get acquired or can extort some more VC.

End of the day; if your company has no actual revenue stream, its not really worth much.

But regardless of what Instagram's real value is, they have $700m in their war chest and they told a dude who did 50k worth of work for them *at their invitation* to fuck himself and then for an encore fucked with his job?

Thats real bad form right there.

How are you shorting twitter?

[Sanlmar]

How are you shorting twitter?

Log into your eTrade account with margin and start pressing buttons.


The degen move is to quit your job and start trading your 401K yourself.

[monsterj]

How are you shorting twitter?

Log into your eTrade account with margin and start pressing buttons.


The degen move is to quit your job and start trading your 401K yourself.

Or you could sell Twitter puts, sell the underlying, buy facebook underlying and buy facebook calls. Now if I were buying meaty ATM options, what would my delta be? What would my Vega be? Am I long or short Vega V, Delta V, Gamma? What is my VIX risk? Where would I make the most money, where would I make the least, where would i break even? What's the probabilities for each? Or am I just doing a simple pair trade?!? My guess is you can't answer any of the questions.

[sonatine]

lol Sanlmar is probably the one person on this site best suited to answer those questions.