San Francisco, May 3 (IANS): Even as Facebook announced plans to launch a dating service at its annual developers' conference this week, media reports said that the social network had to fire one of its security engineers who allegedly abused his power to access information and stalked women online.

The controversy came to light after the employee allegedly called himself a "professional stalker" in a message to a woman he met on Tinder, the Guardian reported on Wednesday.

Facebook said that it was "investigating this as a matter of urgency" while falling short of providing any details on the employee's position or the data he may have accessed.

The allegations surfaced on Sunday in tweets from Jackie Stokes, Founder of the cybersecurity consultancy Spyglass Security.

Stokes said she learned that "a security engineer currently employed at Facebook is likely using privileged access to stalk women online".

"Is that what you're currently doing? Trying to internet stalk me?" the woman reportedly replied.

The news could not have come at a worse time for Fcebook which is already facing scrutiny for its data privacy protection practices.

On Tuesday, during the company's annual developer conference, Facebook announced it would let users opt out of browser history tracking, NBC News reported.