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Visualizing The Devolution Of Privacy On Facebook

By Ben Popken 5.11.10

This chart shows how the default privacy settings on Facebook have gotten less, well, private, from 2005-2010. Created by Matt McKeon based off an EFF timeline, it helps visualize how Facebook has grown increasingly permissive with your data as it has grown in size, power, and revenue. What might tomorrow bring? Perhaps in the future Facebook will create placeholder profiles for people who haven’t signed up yet, using data gleaned from Zabasearch and LexisNexis. Check out Matt’s site for an interactive version.

The Evolution of Privacy on Facebook [mattmckeon via NPR]

security

Facebook Board Member's Profile Hacked

By Ben Popken 5.10.10

Maybe now that one of their board members’ profile got hacked, Facebook will start caring more about your privacy. Nah. [More]

privacy

Five Scary Facebook Monsters Just Waiting To Grab You

By Mary Beth Quirk 5.8.10

Facebook is soo fun, right? A place to reunite with old friends, make new ones, a veritable virtual playground just waiting for you to enjoy it — and share your information with the world, for good or for bad, with or without your knowledge. CBS News takes a look at five common dangers Facebook users are at risk from. [More]

government

Al Franken Teaches You About Critical Facebook Privacy Settings

By Meg Marco 5.7.10

Al Franken, hater of Facebook’s cavalier approach to privacy, has posted instructions for how to keep Facebook from disclosing your personal information to their “partners.” Guess what? It’s kinda hard! No, really, there’s more to it than you might expect. [More]

facebook

Facebook Disables Chat After Bug Exposes Private Data

By marcperton 5.5.10

After two security glitches were revealed today, Facebook was forced to shut down chat functions while it worked on a fix. One bug allowed users to see allegedly private chats, while another exposed pending friend requests. Facebook didn’t notify users whose accounts may have been compromised, presumably because, hey, they’re Facebook, and they don’t have to. [More]

security

Top 10 Reasons To Quit Facebook

By Ben Popken 5.4.10

F**** Facebook! More and more, fed up with ever-disintegrating privacy policies, are saying just that, even going so far as to kill their Facebook accounts. Gizmodo has “Top Ten Reasons You Should Quit Facebook,” among them, one-sided terms of service, a “war on privacy,” the sharing of private data with applications, but perhaps best of fall, “Facebook is not technically competent enough to be trusted”: [More]

advertising

Two Facebook Apps To Help You Fight Back Against Facebook

By cwalters 5.4.10

If you’re unhappy with the latest Facebook privacy settings but don’t want to kill your account completely, ReadWriteWeb has highlighted two services–both Facebook apps–that might give you back some control. They’re not perfect solutions, though. The Green Safe app scrapes all your data into a stand-alone tab that only your friends can access, but it also means a third-party developer will replace Facebook as your data holder (the app will use your data to serve ads as well). The Give Me My Data app lets you export all of your Facebook content so that you don’t lose anything if you disconnect your profile from Facebook’s pages. [More]

consumers union

Facebook's Privacy Settings Are Actually "Evil Interfaces"

By Ben Popken 5.4.10

Facebook is in a quandary: they want to sell their users’ data for cash, but they don’t want to look like doucheshnozzles. What’s a social network to do? Design a byzantine apparatus for opting out of the privacy-invasions that confuses and discourages the user from using it effectively, while still appearing to be user-friendly and functional. That way they can have their cake and eat it and sell it too. In other words, it’s an “evil interface,” and Facebook’s privacy settings are full of them, argues the Electronic Frontier Foundation: [More]

personal information

Franken and Schumer To CEO: We Hate Facebook's Privacy Changes

By Meg Marco 4.27.10

Recent and proposed changes to Facebook’s information sharing policies have Senators Franken (D-MN) and Schumer (D-NY) a little irritated. They’ve penned a letter, along with Michael Bennet (D-CO) and Mark Begich (D-AK), asking Facebook to reconsider their new opt-out procedure, and to take further steps to keep user’s personal details, such as their interests and friend lists, private unless they chose to share them. [More]

safety

New Dry Max Pampers Causing Rash, Burns, Sores, Boils?

By Ben Popken 4.26.10

Pampers new brand of Dry Max diapers causes rashes, burns, sores, and boils on their babies, some parents are alleging in a growing online backlash. But is it really Dry Max, or just typical diaper rash that the parents are incorrectly correlating with the new diaper? [More]

advertising

Senator Asks FTC To Provide Privacy Guidelines For Facebook, Other Social Networks

By cwalters 4.26.10

Senator Charles Schumer is upset on your behalf over Facebook’s latest loosening of its privacy policies, and yesterday he called for the FTC to step in and provide some guidance, offering to introduce legislation if the agency feels it needs that extra authority. Specifically, Schumer wants three things: opt-out defaults should be switched to opt-in, sites should always disclose where the information is going, and there should be some general “guidelines for user privacy” that sites follow. [More]

mark zuckerberg

Facebook Used To Make Partners Delete Your Data After 24 Hrs. No Longer.

By Ben Popken 4.21.10

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced this morning that Facebook will toss a policy that made developers and partners with access your data to delete it after 24 hours. Now they can just keep it. Turns out the privacy policy hindered growth:
Zuckerberg told Inside Facebook: [More]

online

Delete Your Facebook Account Forever

By Ben Popken 4.20.10

Whether you’re trying to get a job and worried about snoopy new bosses, sick of maintaining a virtual profile constantly bombarded with increasingly useless updates and pings from people that you decreasingly actually know, fed up with Facebook’s attitude towards their users, disgusted with your addiction to it, or just want you, your personal details and habits, and photos, out, deleting your Facebook profile can be done in a few easy steps: [More]

advertising

Facebook Kills More Of Your Privacy For Cash

By Ben Popken 4.20.10

Yesterday, Facebook announced an awesome new feature that lets anyone see your current city, hometown, education, work, likes, and interests, even if you’ve set your profile to private. Will this benefit individual users and their friends? Not unless the only thing you remember about your dear friend is that they enjoy leather-play and you’re willing to scroll through reams of headshots to find them. No, this new privacy erosion is for the real clients of Facebook: advertisers, and the data-mining minions that toil on their behalf. However, there are two ways to be totally private. [More]

lawsuits

Towing Company Sues Student Over Facebook Page

By cwalters 4.13.10

T&J Towing of Kalamazoo, MI wants to send a message to anyone in the town who feels like complaining about the company online. They’ve filed a $750,000 defamation lawsuit against a Western Michigan University student for starting a Facebook page about them. [More]

affiliate marketers

Latest Facebook Gift Card Scam Nabs 37,000 Victims In One Day

By cwalters 4.12.10

When you see a free gift card offer on Facebook, just stay away. Last Friday a fake IKEA gift card scam attracted over 37,000 eager Facebook users, and it’s at least the third one to successfully go viral on the site since late March. [More]

facebook

Teen Files Harassment Charges Against Mom For Facebook Snooping

By Chris Morran 4.8.10

When you were a teenager, how many times did you wish you could have called the cops on your parents for being too nosy? It may be too late for you to slap some juris prudence on your folks, but a trailblazing teen in Arkansas has filed harassment charges — criminal, not civil — against his mom for hassling him on Facebook. [More]

credit cards

Kid Racks Up $1,400 In Farmville After Stealing Mom's Credit Card

By Ben Popken 4.8.10

A 12-year-old kid is probably getting his crops slashed and burned by his mum after he racked up $1,400 in Farmville purchases, draining his own savings and running up charges on her credit card. [More]

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