Hackers found a way to make Meta’s AI hand over Instagram accounts

The Instagram account of the Obama White House has not been active for more than nine years, but over the weekend, hackers gained access, defacing the page with pro-Iranian images and messages. And it was Meta AI that gave them the keys to do so. Instructions began circulating online over the weekend for a method to trick the Meta chatbot into transferring control of Instagram accounts. At its core, the hack involved attaching third-party emails to accounts, which allowed attackers to change passwords. Meta spokesperson Andy Stone, in a statement on social media, wrote: “This issue has been resolved and we are securing impacted accounts.” This issue has been resolved and we are securing impacted accounts.— Andy Stone (@andymstone) June 1, 2026 The security hole was discovered roughly three months after Meta turned over control of some customer service issues, such as resetting forgotten passwords, to AI. While the high-profile accounts were the headline grabbers, hundreds of accounts were affected. “These aren’t some random new accounts. These are verified, locked down accounts and they still got compromised,” said one user who claimed to have several accounts affected by the hackers. “The whole thing just highlighted how stupid it is to automate account security without any human in the loop. One AI fooling another AI while there’s literally no person anywhere to catch it. … Now, thankfully, it’s patched but I don’t think it will be the last one.” The hack was a fairly simple one. Bad actors, using a VPN connection with an IP address in or near the target’s usual hometown, would ask the chatbot to link the account to a new email address. Meta AI would then send a onetime code to that address, authenticating it and enabling a password reset. Once the password was reset, the hackers were in control. It is unknown exactly how many Instagram accounts were compromised in the attacks. Beyond the Obama White House account, t