Facebook promises “less complex privacy tools”
Does Facebook actually care about your right to privacy? We'll see.
A couple of weeks ago, I voiced some of my concerns about the decline of Facebook’s privacy controls. I even considered deleting my account after having some troubles trudging through the myriad of privacy controls that seemed to be set up to frustrate and discourage people from making any changes whatsoever. But I caved and kept my account after figuring out how to lock my account down so that only friends had access to my info.
The temptation to remove myself from Facebook is still there. The only thing holding me back is the thought that many of my friends and family depend on Facebook as a reliable means to get in touch with me. You know, since I don’t have a cell phone or anything. /sarcasmoff
The site and its creator, Mark Zuckerberg, have been catching some flak for what many essentially view as an invasion of privacy and with just cause. There are a number of my friends on Facebook who did not realize their phone number and home address were pretty much out there for the world to see after the last batch of changes to Facebook’s privacy policy.
Zuckerberg did, however, apologize for the “complexity??? of the privacy controls in an open letter to the Washington Post and made a pledge to both simplify the privacy controls and enforce stricter guidelines to protect the private information of Facebook’s 400 million plus users. Maybe the poll by the Internet security firm Sophos, showing that 60% of the Facebook users they polled were ready to bail over privacy concerns, played a part in that?
Whatever the reasons, Zuckerberg has lost a lot of ground with users with his apparent disregard for personal privacy and the release of a chat transcript that would seem damning in regards to the level of trust users have given him over the years. And that transcript would seem to reflect the string of changes that have been made to the privacy policy over the years.
I know I’ve harped on Facebook and privacy issues quite a bit in recent weeks but my heart is in the right place… Or I’m paranoid, one of the two. But the point here is that while you may do your utmost to protect your own information, you can’t control the actions of others. As it stands now, any information anyone else might have in regards to you is essentially up for grabs if you know where to look. We don’t need more concerns about our private information, social networking site or otherwise.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go make a new tinfoil cap.
Gritskrieg – End of Line
Tags: Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, Privacy Rights
