In this task, you are given a text of many news articles seperated by special token "|||||". Your task is to summarize them.
Q: Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images 
  
 UPDATE 2 (2:48 p.m. EST): A Facebook spokesperson responded to our email for comment by saying that the old messages now appearing on walls were in fact old wall posts and not private messages. Facebook sent the same statement to TechCrunch, but reporter Coleen Taylor said she believes that private messages are appearing on her wall and the walls of friends. 
  
 It is possible that this is all related to confusion about how we viewed wall posts way back in 2007—more as items we were sharing personally and directly with friends than posts that most of the world could see. In retrospect, those items might now look as though they were private, when in fact they were just the old way we did wall posts. Still, there seem to have been a whole lot of French people who were fairly positive that old private messages were appearing on their walls, and not old public wall posts. Here is Facebook's statement in full: 
  
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 "A small number of users raised concerns after what they mistakenly believed to be private messages appeared on their Timeline. Our engineers investigated these reports and found that the messages were older wall posts that had always been visible on the users' profile pages. Facebook is satisfied that there has been no breach of user privacy." 
  
 UPDATE (1:59 p.m. EST): TechCrunch is reporting that the issue is now starting to affect Facebook accounts in the United States. We will continue to monitor the situation. 
  
 ORIGINAL POST: Today, Facebook users in France are reporting what appears to be a major problem: Private messages are showing up on public Facebook walls. Messages sent between 2007 and 2009 were reportedly the only ones showing up at first, but some French news outlets are now saying that private messages sent as recently as last year are being published publicly. 
  
 The messages are apparently appearing directly on users’ Facebook walls and in the box on the right rail that says “[#] friends posted on [user]’s timeline.” 
  
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 According to the French newspaper Metro, which first reported the problem, the issue is not systematic and affects only certain accounts. It’s not clear yet how many users are affected, but still, our colleagues as Slate.fr have wondered whether this is the biggest privacy scandal in the history of Facebook. 
  
 France’s biggest newspaper, Le Monde, is now leading its site with a front-page story titled “Private Messages Made Public and Plunging Stock: A Dark Day for Facebook.” (The second part of the headline seems to be unrelated to the first; Facebook stock has dropped nearly ten percent today after a report by the financial magazine Barrons said it was still overpriced.) 
  
 Facebook was unaware of the problem before it was reported by Metro on Monday afternoon in France. 
  
 Facebook representatives told the French news site 20Minutes.fr that they are “in the middle of investigating to see whether this is a bug or not a bug.” They didn’t clarify what “not a bug” meant, but presumably the other option is a hack. 
  
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 Asked whether the bug was a worldwide issue or exclusive to France, Facebook told 20 Minutes “we don’t know, it’s the beginning of the investigation. But we are looking at this very closely.” 
  
 Facebook has had problems with security before, but only really when changes to privacy policies have confused users and made wall posts that could previously be seen only by friends available to the public at large. Never before has anything been reported where private messages between friends were published publicly on this kind of a mass scale. 
  
 Facebook has yet to respond to our email requesting comment. 
  
 If you’re using Facebook in France right now, you might want to make sure that your private exchanges are not showing up publicly. I, for one, am going to start checking my own wall regularly from my office in D.C. I wouldn’t want my friends and colleagues reading the embarrassing pet names my wife and I have for each other. 
  
  ||||| Update at 5:30PM EST: How to remove all your old Facebook wall posts, public or private, from your Timeline 
  
 Facebook has been accused of inadvertently publishing private messages on users’ Timeline profiles from the years 2007, 2008, 2009, and possibly even earlier. The issue was first reported by Metro France, but soon reports from all over over started to flood in. Facebook has denied the claims, saying the posts in questions are indeed old Wall posts, but readers are saying otherwise. 
  
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 A quick check with my The Next Web colleagues around the world shows that this issue isn’t happening to everyone. At first it looked as if English-speaking countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada were not affected, but a closer look seems to show this isn’t necessarily true. At least one reader from the UK says it is happening to them as well. 
  
 It’s thus very possible this privacy screwup has nothing to do with where you are, as Facebook sometimes tests (and breaks) things with randomly-selected users. That being said, the reports first started in France, and Anna Heim, one of our reporters from France, confirmed that she is seeing the problem. 
  
 Here is a screenshot of private messages she sent to her friends, posted publicly on her Timeline: 
  
 If you are seeing this problem, please let us know where you are located. You may also want to hide all your messages by clicking on the drop-down arrow in the top right, clicking on Privacy Settings, clicking on Timeline and Tagging (Edit Settings), and making sure nothing is set to Public. 
  
 You can also change settings here to Custom (Only Me) if you want to be absolutely certain your private messages aren’t visible to people they shouldn’t be. This is a temporary solution, however, as these private messages should not be appearing on Facebook Timelines. 
  
 I have contacted Facebook about this issue. I will update you if and when I hear back. 
  
 Update at 2:00PM EST: Reports are coming in from readers all over the world (not just France and the UK) saying private messages have appeared on their Timeline. It’s important to note the difference between messages that were posted on your Wall way back when, and that Facebook is highlighting on your Timeline in the Friends box, compared to private messages that should not be there. Facebook will have a tough time differentiating between the two types of reports as panic ensues. 
  
 Update at 2:30PM EST: Facebook has told the BBC that these are older messages that were always present on users’ profiles, before and after Timeline. “Facebook is satisfied that there has been no breach of user privacy,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement. 
  
 Update at 2:55PM EST: Just like Anna Heim, readers are finding Facebook’s statement hard to believe. They are pointing to addresses and phone numbers appearing on their Timeline, as well as showing up on their friends’ Timelines, which would have only been sent as private messages. I have contacted Facebook again for further information. 
  
 Update at 3:25PM EST: TechCrunch has received a longer statement from Facebook. Again the company is denying the claims: 
  
 Every report we’ve seen, we’ve gone back and checked. We haven’t seen one report that’s been confirmed. A lot of the confusion is because before 2008 there were no likes and no comments on wall posts. People went back and forth with wall posts instead of having a conversation [via comments]. A small number of users raised concerns after what they mistakenly believed to be private messages appeared on their Timeline. Our engineers investigated these reports and found that the messages were older wall posts that had always been visible on the users’ profile pages. Facebook is satisfied that there has been no breach of user privacy. 
  
 Despite this, we’re still getting more and more reports from readers insisting their private messages sent to and from friends are appearing on their Timelines. It looks to me as if users are confused as to what is happening, and Facebook’s history isn’t helping the situation. 
  
 Update at 5:30PM EST: How to remove all your old Facebook wall posts, public or private, from your Timeline 
  
 Image credit: stock.xchng 
  
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A: 
Are people's private Facebook messages appearing in their Timelines today? French newspapers posted stories saying as much, and similar incidents cropped up in the US, reports Slate, but now TechCrunch reports that the messages from 2007 to 2009 are actually old wall posts that were never private in the first place. Facebook concurs, saying that "a lot of the confusion is because before 2009 there were no likes and no comments on wall posts. People went back and forth with wall posts instead of having a conversation." In fact, Facebook says the messages were always available in Timeline, and the issue just cropped up in France because Timeline was recently rolled out there. Not everyone is convinced, however: "Readers are finding Facebook’s statement hard to believe," reports TheNextWeb, which says readers are pointing out phone numbers and addresses in the postings—"which would have only been sent as private messages."