Why is anyone surprised that Facebook can’t protect privacy?
Facebook's "privacy" statement has 5,380 words, while the US Constitution has only 4,543 words. Facebook's "privacy" FAQ has 45,000 words. According to the New York Times, "To manage your privacy on Facebook, you will need to navigate through 50 settings with more than 170 options."
Facebook is the equivalent of leaving your personal journal lying around (or other modern equivalent). There is no privacy. If you can’t deal with that, you shouldn’t be on Facebook. So: Why is anyone surprised that Facebook can’t protect privacy?
Update 15/05/10: The Columbia Journalism Review published a tidy summation of all this sudden interest in Facebook’s disdain for privacy. The article calls Facebook “a corporation run amok”, and I can’t disagree with that assessment.
A Tip o’ the Hat to veteran journalist Rex Wockner who sent out the links to both articles I've linked to (I blame my cold for forgetting to credit him yesterday).
7 comments:
Re Facebook, front page story today re abject stupidity.
I agree, seems to be the meme of the week for lazy journalists -- oh no! Stuff on the Internet might be read! I have no problem with being on Facebook as long as you use common-sense. It's no revelation that information might be used against you, but the entire notion of the Internet defies traditional 'privacy' concerns anyway.
I've never had a personal profile on Facebook, but I do have a page for Slap Upside The Head. I've noticed that, amidst the recent Facebook privacy policy getting lots of media attention, several people have left my page, having quit Facebook over privacy concerns. (Well... that, or they just don't like my site anymore. (sobs quietly).)
At any rate, it's a great sign. I'd much prefer a social network based on open standards where we control our own data and no one company can access it all. It'd be similar to how email is based on open standards; you don't need to have your very own email server, but there's a lot of choice out there and all servers interoperate.
Roger: What public officials do on sites like Facebook is completely relevant, so the guy in that article you linked to accusing a journalist of "character assassination" is really rich: He did a pretty good job of doing that himself, it seems to me. Elsewhere, a teabagger candidate posted that he wanted to declare "open season" on liberals with no "bag limit". We'll see more of this sort of thing, I think.
Nik: I think that many people have unreasonable expectations of privacy on the Internet generally, and social media specifically. Maybe what's new is that they're now noticing (through journalists) just how NOT private things like Facebook really are.
Mark: My Facebook page started out as a way to promote my podcast, so I never really put anything personal on it. I never post photos (both Flicr and Picassa have much better privacy controls—which means, really, that they actually have privacy controls, plus they don't claim ownership of your media). I also don't post any truly personal information. My rule is that if I'm uncomfortable with strangers knowing a thing, it doesn't go on Facebook, and that's precisely because I know it won't be private.
As for open source, a "privacy aware, personally controlled, do-it-all distributed open source social network" called Diaspora is under development. We'll see…
I have a Facebook page. But I have to say I think the site is not all that user friendly. And to be honest I just don't get all the big to do over it. I like what Betty White said about it on Saturday Night Live last week:
Now that I know what Facebook is it sounds like a complete waist of time. I wouldn't say people on it are losers but that's only because I'm polite.
As to the notion of "privacy" on the internet that's just silly.
Part of my problem with Facebook is that it doesn't really serve any useful purpose in my life. But I'm going to update this topic in a new post.
The whole facebook privacy whinge reminds me a lot of the whole government wiretapping whinge a couple of years ago, and I still love Bill Mahar's Response to it:
"So what if the government is paying attention to what you say on your cellphone. Chances are the person on the other end of the phone isn't. This country is obsessed with everyone knowing what they are doing every second of every day: 'follow my myspace, my facebook, my twitter... don't think it's interesting enough? I'll make shit up!' [shows picture of James Frey and "A million little peices"]"
It's the Internet! A network for sharing information. Furthermore, facebook is a piece of the Internet dedicated to finding as many people as possible to share your blather-with in the vain hopes that some percentage of those people find it interesting... It's a big Internet bullhorn aimed at tweens with lots of places to attach sparkley gewgaws. So people complaining that it has 'privacy issues' seems ludicrous.
I can understand the wish to try and limit the exposure of some of the stuff you say and your personal information... but it's the Internet... which was purpose built for the sake of search and audit history. So I see all this privacy craziness as a manifestation of "oversharer's remorse".
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