Snapchat apologizes for massive spam outbreak

Snapchat delayed apologizing for a big user data breach last month but was quick to say sorry today to users who received “Snap Spam” over the weekend. “We’ve heard some complaints over the weekend about an increase in Snap Spam on our service. We want to apologize for any unwanted Snaps and let you know our team is working on resolving the issue,” Snapchat wrote in a blog post today. However, it said the issue appeared to be unrelated to the user data breach.

Those private ephemeral ads for losing pounds and enhancing penis size you see above appeared in my Snapchat feed yesterday, along with a handful of new “friends” in my contacts. I’m not the only one being inundated by spam. My privacy settings allow anyone to contact me (no dick pics, please), but I’m not sure if users with stricter settings have also been affected. I’ve reached out to Snapchat to see if the spam is related to the company’s callous approach to a security breach that forced them to hire a lobbyist for fear of dealing with lawsuits and FTC investigations. So far, there’s no mention of the spam outbreak on the Snapchat blog where the company recently addressed a leak that exposed 4.6 million Snapchat accounts.