Facebook privacy has reared its head again, with news coming
out late last week that the social media network was rolling
out a new feature.
The feature will require outside applications and websites to
tell users exactly what parts of their profile they need to
access in order to work.
Applications already had to ask users for permission to
access anything in their profile that was not public.
But they did not have to specify what information they were
using.
Such information can include your photos, your friends'
birthdays or your email address.
The changes are part of Facebook's co-operation with Canada's
privacy commissioner who has been among the sharpest critics
of the company's privacy policies.
It also emerged late last month that Facebook, and several
other social networking sites, had been sharing users'
personal data with advertisers.
The problem was that the data had been shared without the
consent or knowledge of users.
The Wall Street Journal published an article which seemed to
get Facebook to finally respond to users' concerns.
The issue was first raised back in August, 2009 by
researchers from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and AT&T
Labs, but Facebook chose to ignore their concerns.
Facebook responded that it was aware of one case where if a
user took a specific route on the site, advertisers might see
they clicked on their own profile and then clicked on an
advertisement.
"We fixed this case as soon as we heard about it."
The information included user names and ID numbers that could
be traced back to individual profiles.
Large advertising companies, including Google's DoubleClick
and Yahoo's Right Media, were identified as having received
the information although they claimed to have not made use of
it.
The information could be used to look up individual profiles,
which, depending on the site and the information a user had
made public, included such things as a person's name, age,
home town and occupation.
Whether Facebook was responding genuinely to the concerns of
users of whether the threat of competition has caused its
contrition is a moot point.
While "Google me" sounds a bit like what an Auckland business
person might say at a bar, it appears it might be Google's
latest attempt at becoming relevant in social media.
Kevin Rose, of Digg, got speculation rolling with a tweet
that Google was working on a social service called Google Me
that would compete with Facebook, perhaps Google's largest
rival for attention on the internet.
On Tuesday, last week, former Facebook executive and Quora
founder Adam D'Angelo took things a bit further by declaring
on Quora that: "This is not a rumour.
This is a real project.
There are a large number of people working on it.
I am completely confident about this."
CNet reported that no-one seems to really know what Google Me
might actually be.
But it does appear to be somehow related to users' Google
Profile, a service that got a boost with the debut of Google
Buzz earlier this year.
Google Buzz, not universally popular, lets users share links,
pictures and thoughts with friends who find them through
their Google Profile.
Social media has been one of Google's most elusive goals and
CNet says Google has not caused anything that has "moved the
needle" on social media.
Google Buzz caused a huge privacy flap on its launch and does
not appear to have caught on with the general public even
after Google fixed those contentious privacy issues.
Google Latitude has a reasonable user base but has been
overtaken by a location start-up - Foursquare - that it
actually had the blueprints for in house after acquiring
Foursquare Founder Dennis Crowley's earlier start-up,
Dodgeball.
Google Me will be the first project designed entirely by the
new group dedicated to the task by Google.
If it is eventually launched, bloggers expect Google to do
its homework on the privacy front and pitch the service as
anti-Facebook, with clear privacy controls and easily
exported data.
Privacy is always a concern when you are spending time on the
internet.
Facebook is just one company which has landed itself in
trouble over privacy.
If the new applications work, and Google does launch Google
Me, a small step to safety could be on the way.
dene.mackenzie@odt.co.nz
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