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About LinkBacksRead more.Facebook risks losing all control over the privacy debate so its founder has started speaking publicly.
Read more.Facebook risks losing all control over the privacy debate so its founder has started speaking publicly.
I've already had friends send me messages saying that they are leaving facebook because of this.
So, I'm sure by now you are aware of the the privacy changes Facebook have been making lately. None of these have been for the better, and all are designed purely so Facebook can profit off our otherwise private information. As a security professional I can't, in all good consciousness, continue to use Facebook and add yet more dollars to Mark Zuckerbergs ever growing bank account.
Seriously? Leaving aside auto-opting people into sharing information that they never agreed to share? Undertaking a course of behaviour DESIGNED to make it more difficult to control your privacy settings over a course of years? Deliberately rejigging their privacy policy REPEATEDLY to make it more opaque? I mean, come on, "not clear"? *sheesh* The only thing they've "improved" is moving from explicitly calling their users "dumb f*cks" to just implicitly treating them that way. I logged in to FB today (yes, I use it) to find that it wanted to automatically share whole rafts of information which had previously been private - naturally, all the "tell the whole world" boxes were ticked, but that hardly breeds confidence in their new approach, does it?It's not clear what Facebook has done fundamentally wrong, other than make it too complicated to manage the settings on your Facebook account.
Clearly not!
I have never registered on facebook, lucky me!
Just to be clear, I'm not on a one-man anti-Zuckerberg crusade, but the man's own conduct and that of his company forces words like "disingenuous" and "mendacious" to the front of one's mind. I also think that referring to the gathering controversy around their behaviour as a "witch-hunt" is probably a bit steep; if one is surrounded by a swarm of angry hornets, one might, before cursing the hornets, first reflect upon the (un)wisdom of knocking the hell out of their nest with a big stick?Originally Posted by Scott B
Clearly not!
Nor have I, or will I. Or not with genuine details anyway. The only way I would sign up would be to lie my ass off over the details, which not only breaks their T&Cs but rather defeats most of the point of signing up anyway. So why bother?
As far as I'm concerned, it's as simple as this - if you put info on the web, you at the very least risk it going out of your control. If you aren't prepared to risk it, don't put it out there. Hardly rocket science.
As far as privacy goes, there is a LOT out there about most of us anyway. It might not be much, but all we can do is to not make it easier for those that want to use our personal details. And, as the biggest single use of those details is targeted advertising and I don't want advertising, targeted or not, I certainly don't intend to help the advertisers. Hence, no Facebook account, or Twitter etc, and if even Hexus ever makes providing personal details mandatory, I'm outta here.
I appreciate your point, but if a service holds itself forth as both respecting and allowing you to control your privacy (albeit relying for its business model on the belief that you will choose to allow some of your data to be shared), I would have said that it is not unreasonable to expect it to abide by that undertaking.As far as I'm concerned, it's as simple as this - if you put info on the web, you at the very least risk it going out of your control. If you aren't prepared to risk it, don't put it out there. Hardly rocket science.
The term 'witch hunt' makes no comment - good or bad - on the subject of it, as it instead refers to the behaviour of the mob.
I've removed all friends and changed all the privacy options I could find..
I still find the right side of my window full of links saying xyz number of friends like this..
Yet I have no friends...
The proverb: It is easier to ask forgiveness than permission[*] springs to mind, and Facebook are serial offenders in in this way when it comes to privacy issues.
The way I see it, it is forgivable to do something before asking permission if you think that it will probably be OK, but if you get told-off every time, then you need to start asking permission before doing questionable stuff, as otherwise it looks like you are taking advantage and "seeing what you can get away with".
[*] Credited to Grace Hopper
Saracen (26-05-2010)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/05...k_connections/
Note the effect of choosing NOT to share any of the details in your profile; Facebook deletes the information from your profile - so you either share it or lose it. Nice.
I agree, it's not unreasonable to expect it. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say it's not unreasonable to believe you should be able to expect it.
The thing is .... I don't expect it.
I expect these companies to do what they are there to do, which is make money. If they can do it legally, albeit by devious and even deceitful means, then that is what I expect them to do. Rarely am I disappointed.
Maybe that makes me a cynic. Maybe it makes me a realist. I've long held to the old definition of a cynic and a realist born of experience. But maybe that's just cynicism speaking.
It comes down to this - they can use or abuse what they don't have. I value my privacy, so I won't surrender it without a very good reason. Now, maybe other people value their privacy less than I do, or maybe they value the service from these companies more than I do. Either way, it's a cost-benefit calculation, and personally, I see nowhere near the level of benefit necessary for me to be willing to bear the cost. It's why I don't have store "reward" cards, and why I buy most of my stuff in supermarkets with cash. I know I give up on a few tens of pounds of discounts, but I'm not selling my privacy to Tesco, or whomever, so such a paltry sum.
So ... do I trust "respecting" companies? Hell, I don't trust Tesco, and I sure as hell don't trust banks. Why the hell would I trust, as in regard to "respecting", some Johnny-Come-Lately US software house that's only been around, in the scheme of things, 5 minutes?
Nicho, I read the T&Cs on these things. It nearly always gives them the right to change those T&Cs merely by posting the new version, and by continued use of the service, you agree to them. That, really, is just a legalistic nod and wink to the niceties of saying "we can do anything we damn well like with the info .... and probably will".
For instance, you nearly always sign away the right to have data kept within the EU, and therefore authorise it to be transferred outside Data Protection Act (and EU versions) coverage. You also nearly always authorise them to transfer any and all data to other companies, both "partner2 companies for operational reasons, and to buyers of the company. So you aren't just trusting Facebook, or eBay, or whoever, you're trusting their "partners".
Now, call it just my cynicism if you like, but my view is that trusting outfits like Facebook is simply naive. There have been many parallels, and companies virtually always operate in their own commercial best interest and will respect customer's privacy if and only if it's in that commercial best interest to do so. I don't trust Facebook, or any similar operation, any further than I could throw Mars.
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