Young social media company Snapchat has added new user privacy features to ensure the online privacy of its nearly 4.6 million users.

The photo sharing service said that it made changes to system to make it harder for attackers to get Snapchat users phone numbers and username information.

The company said that the Snapchat community provided a platform for friends to comfortably express themselves and the company was dedicated to prevent and abuse.

Announcing the changes, Snapchat said, "We will be releasing an updated version of the Snapchat application that will allow Snapchaters to opt out of appearing in Find Friends after they have verified their phone number."

The company announced the changes around a week after researchers at Gibson Security reported a loophole in the apps system that could allow hackers to access user information via the feature "Find Friends" and expose millions of usernames and their phone numbers.

Snapchat admitted the vulnerability, saying it was possible, but didn't present any real solutions to prevent the potential misuse.  Neither Gibson Security researchers did do the social network any favour by publically posting details of the data-mining API vulnerability, nor did Snapchat do its users any favour by responding days later with a blog post that just brushed the issue aside.