Meta accused of snarfing people's Snapchat data via traffic decryption

Unsealed court documents allege Meta (then Facebook) operated “Project Ghostbusters” and the IAAP program from 2016–2019, using Onavo research apps that installed a root CA on participant devices to perform MITM decryption of encrypted analytics traffic from Snapchat, later YouTube and Amazon, to gather competitive intelligence and impact rivals’ ad businesses. Internal emails describe distributing interception “kits” via third parties to obscure Facebook’s role, while plaintiffs argue the scheme amounted to criminal wiretapping and anticompetitive conduct tied to Meta’s AI/ML data usage; litigation remains ongoing.