Facebook privacy controls don't work even when you use them(sfgate.com)
sfgate.com
Facebook privacy controls don't work even when you use them
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/ybenjamin/detail??blogid=150&entry_id=63879
10 comments
It doesn't matter that he's wrong. What matters is that the media has gotten a hold of this, and isn't going to let go any time soon.
Facebook is rapidly losing control of the narrative. They need to do some PR damage control quickly, or they're going to see this kind of fearmongering metastasize into something truly harmful to their business.
Just wait until a 'facebook allows sexual predators to stalk your children' story pops up and goes viral. I give it a week, two at the outside.
Facebook is rapidly losing control of the narrative. They need to do some PR damage control quickly, or they're going to see this kind of fearmongering metastasize into something truly harmful to their business.
Just wait until a 'facebook allows sexual predators to stalk your children' story pops up and goes viral. I give it a week, two at the outside.
> It doesn't matter that he's wrong.
No, no! It really does. Because we can't support the idea that it is going to be reported wrong - how is that going to help?
> facebook allows sexual predators to stalk your children' story pops up and goes viral.
That doesn't need this privacy thing to make a story. Facebook is already one of the prime ways that predators contact and stalk children (after all it is only one friend acceptance that is required to skip past plenty of privacy controls).
Also, it's a silly story because childrens profiles are pretty solidly restricted (under all sorts of rules and guidelines).
More importantly; there has been a story here in the media for the last few months regarding a "predator alert" button. Organisations in the UK are trying to get chat providers to place it prominently on Childrens profiles. Facebook have declined and the story has been all about that refusal and how bad FB is.
But the public don't seem to care all that much.... I'm not convinced this privacy story will interest them much more...
No, no! It really does. Because we can't support the idea that it is going to be reported wrong - how is that going to help?
> facebook allows sexual predators to stalk your children' story pops up and goes viral.
That doesn't need this privacy thing to make a story. Facebook is already one of the prime ways that predators contact and stalk children (after all it is only one friend acceptance that is required to skip past plenty of privacy controls).
Also, it's a silly story because childrens profiles are pretty solidly restricted (under all sorts of rules and guidelines).
More importantly; there has been a story here in the media for the last few months regarding a "predator alert" button. Organisations in the UK are trying to get chat providers to place it prominently on Childrens profiles. Facebook have declined and the story has been all about that refusal and how bad FB is.
But the public don't seem to care all that much.... I'm not convinced this privacy story will interest them much more...
Facebook is already one of the prime ways that predators contact and stalk children
citation needed?
citation needed?
I work in computer forensics (so from experience). :)
What (if anything) would you ask Facebook to do to help with this problem?
It seems to me that a paedophile using Facebook to contact kids will be very visible with certain statistical analysis of user behavior.
It seems to me that a paedophile using Facebook to contact kids will be very visible with certain statistical analysis of user behavior.
Not much more than they are already. There isn't an awful lot you can do to prevent this happening because there are too many variables.
> It seems to me that a paedophile using Facebook to contact kids will be very visible with certain statistical analysis of user behavior
I'm cautious of such methods - they aren't infallible, and what do you do with the results? Read their messages to be sure? Contact the police? Put a warning on their profile that others can see? All of that feels worrisome.
Really your kid being talked to by a pedophile is reasonably low probability. The chance of them being coerced into sending a photo or meeting them is also fairly low (for the most part those who use chat in this way aren't particularly predatory - they are more ill, or lonely and mislead. Not that this excuses them ofc).
Ultimately education of parent and kids seems the best solution.
> It seems to me that a paedophile using Facebook to contact kids will be very visible with certain statistical analysis of user behavior
I'm cautious of such methods - they aren't infallible, and what do you do with the results? Read their messages to be sure? Contact the police? Put a warning on their profile that others can see? All of that feels worrisome.
Really your kid being talked to by a pedophile is reasonably low probability. The chance of them being coerced into sending a photo or meeting them is also fairly low (for the most part those who use chat in this way aren't particularly predatory - they are more ill, or lonely and mislead. Not that this excuses them ofc).
Ultimately education of parent and kids seems the best solution.
It's more than that. CEOP (which isn't even the government, it's just an advocacy group that sells "diversity training" and so on) wants their panic button on EVERY page on FB.
But the case they use to justify this was a kid groomed by a paedophile on MSN, which does have the CEOP panic button, but no-one bothered to press it.
Basically CEOP are publicity whores who have just latched onto "won't someone think of the children!" as their vehicle to fame. And it seems to be working for them.
But the case they use to justify this was a kid groomed by a paedophile on MSN, which does have the CEOP panic button, but no-one bothered to press it.
Basically CEOP are publicity whores who have just latched onto "won't someone think of the children!" as their vehicle to fame. And it seems to be working for them.
Yeh, in case it didn't come across - I am entirely in agreement with Facebook on this.
Especially as CEOP claim it is a "brilliant solution" when we tried to open a debate with them at a panel meeting....
I can see how it might be useful in a few circumstances (if done tastefully...) but a "big red button" is just silly, scaremongering and ultimately useless.
Especially as CEOP claim it is a "brilliant solution" when we tried to open a debate with them at a panel meeting....
I can see how it might be useful in a few circumstances (if done tastefully...) but a "big red button" is just silly, scaremongering and ultimately useless.
Agree with your sentiment. But what we really need is a substitute for facebook. Until that comes, folks who want to socialize will continue to use facebook.
There are already several alternatives to facebook. For example Google's orkut.com Seems to be popular in India. All the developers I work with there use it rather than fb.
Does anyone else see the irony in proposing any Google service as a remedy to privacy issues? Remember Buzz.
Hmm, at least they fixed it and apologized.
Orkut privacy settings fit in one tab. There are seven settings of which five have just two options. All in simple English. I don't need to read a blog article to understand them. What is your excuse, facebook?
Orkut privacy settings fit in one tab. There are seven settings of which five have just two options. All in simple English. I don't need to read a blog article to understand them. What is your excuse, facebook?
The college students are steadily shifting towards facebook. Orkut was popular, but now the latest social networking media is Facebook.
Is it just me, or is this guy actually wrong (and contradicting himself)? From his article:
That is not what I expected because I explicitly said that ONLY FRIENDS could see my bio, birthday and posts by me. I never authorized FRIENDS OF FRIENDS but so long as I have a shared friend with someone, they get to see my sparse profile.
When he stated earlier:
If a person has a mutual friend with me, they will find pretty sparse results searching me and should find NO results from any post I have made.
If you look at the posted image in the article, his birthday, bio, and posts are not showing (correct behavior). I think he may just have his terminology mixed up. The "posts" he is referring to google indexing are posts on the wall of a group or event, which aren't covered under "Post" privacy settings (which refer to your own wall posts).
I am all for some Facebook bashing, but reading this article makes my head hurt, probably because privacy settings can just get complicated.
That is not what I expected because I explicitly said that ONLY FRIENDS could see my bio, birthday and posts by me. I never authorized FRIENDS OF FRIENDS but so long as I have a shared friend with someone, they get to see my sparse profile.
When he stated earlier:
If a person has a mutual friend with me, they will find pretty sparse results searching me and should find NO results from any post I have made.
If you look at the posted image in the article, his birthday, bio, and posts are not showing (correct behavior). I think he may just have his terminology mixed up. The "posts" he is referring to google indexing are posts on the wall of a group or event, which aren't covered under "Post" privacy settings (which refer to your own wall posts).
I am all for some Facebook bashing, but reading this article makes my head hurt, probably because privacy settings can just get complicated.
" this article makes my head hurt, probably because privacy settings can just get complicated." [emphasis mine]
I think the point is that if the privacy settings are so complicated that even computer literate people have difficulty understanding them, then fb is duplicitous in the sense that this just isn't (and shouldn't!) be so complicated and they are exploiting users' misunderstanding to their own benefit. Assuming, of course, that fb having more information to share and target ads against is to their benefit, which I think is true.
If fb wanted to make this right, they could start by giving you a simple set of settings, including one which reverted to the privacy settings of 2 or 3 years ago.
I think the point is that if the privacy settings are so complicated that even computer literate people have difficulty understanding them, then fb is duplicitous in the sense that this just isn't (and shouldn't!) be so complicated and they are exploiting users' misunderstanding to their own benefit. Assuming, of course, that fb having more information to share and target ads against is to their benefit, which I think is true.
If fb wanted to make this right, they could start by giving you a simple set of settings, including one which reverted to the privacy settings of 2 or 3 years ago.
I don't think there was much to be confused about there. He wanted something to show up unexpectedly, so he made it happen by interpreting everything wrong.
I don't know a ton about Facebook privacy, but by the time I was a few paragraphs in, it became obvious that this guy knows way less than me.
As another commenter noted, this article is partly nonsensical, and to the extent that it is coherent, it is wrong.
There have been at least half a dozen articles on Hacker News recently with exaggerated or incorrect claims about Facebook and privacy. I wrote about this "mob behavior" here: http://33bits.org/2010/05/10/facebook-privacy-public-opinion...
It is interesting that the discontent about Facebook has reached such levels that anything at all can kick up an outrage. It is also depressing that this is the top story on Hacker News. It is what I would have expected from Digg or Reddit.
There have been at least half a dozen articles on Hacker News recently with exaggerated or incorrect claims about Facebook and privacy. I wrote about this "mob behavior" here: http://33bits.org/2010/05/10/facebook-privacy-public-opinion...
It is interesting that the discontent about Facebook has reached such levels that anything at all can kick up an outrage. It is also depressing that this is the top story on Hacker News. It is what I would have expected from Digg or Reddit.
as far as 'not working', one bizarre thing I noticed lately in Facebook is that stuff that you delete on your wall doesn't get removed from the 'news feed' that everybody else sees.
So for example, there is no way to silently 'like' or comment on a post or somebody's picture. Even though you delete the corresponding entry on your wall, it still remains on the news feed...
This is actually very old behaviour. I used to have a couple of test accounts from when I was developing a silly FB app; I remember being curious about this exact thing and testing it. Deleting a story from your own personal feed/wall has never suppressed it from appearing in the general news feed of others.
I really dont think that many people are surprised by this. When Facebook launched their new API's, they did it hastily, and in a sudden move, rather than rolling them out slowly. In doing so, several things were borked, such as the dev forum, a lot built on the old api, and all semblance of privacy.
While this is bad, it is also a huge privacy shift. Anyone remember the old Wired interview with Zuck, where he explicitly said that he was making it private, and a walled garden, on purpose, to get people to share more? Now, that has basically been reversed, and the communication from FBHQ has been sparse and done little to reassure or fix things.
While this is bad, it is also a huge privacy shift. Anyone remember the old Wired interview with Zuck, where he explicitly said that he was making it private, and a walled garden, on purpose, to get people to share more? Now, that has basically been reversed, and the communication from FBHQ has been sparse and done little to reassure or fix things.
This article literally has no content. "Literally" as in there is the author's name (in what looks like a banner ad), then 4 comments. The article text is missing.
I thought that, in a massive twist of irony, AdBlock had blocked a spammy article. Unfortunately it turns out that the article content is just completely missing (tried firefox, safari, and chrome).
I thought that, in a massive twist of irony, AdBlock had blocked a spammy article. Unfortunately it turns out that the article content is just completely missing (tried firefox, safari, and chrome).
I think it might have been taken down (for whatever reason).
Wow, that article is not well written, I was re-reading things trying to understand what he's on about.
[deleted]
You guys are a bunch of pompous hacks... A careful read shows it's a regular guy's POV. What's the difference between a forum post and don't post any of my wall posts to an ordinary user???
You're missing the point. Facebook's privacy controls does not work for most people. It might work for Facebook employees or folks who are developing companies they want to sell to FB.
You're missing the point. Facebook's privacy controls does not work for most people. It might work for Facebook employees or folks who are developing companies they want to sell to FB.
> Facebook's privacy controls does not work for most people.
[citation needed]
In all seriousness I've been messing around with Facebook privacy for the last 18 months. Most of my friends are either a) unbothered or b) were perfectly capable of setting up their privacy
There was a little bit of a learning curve (this is what FB must must improve) but from my occasional tests/observation most people have locked up their profiles sufficiently.
[citation needed]
In all seriousness I've been messing around with Facebook privacy for the last 18 months. Most of my friends are either a) unbothered or b) were perfectly capable of setting up their privacy
There was a little bit of a learning curve (this is what FB must must improve) but from my occasional tests/observation most people have locked up their profiles sufficiently.
Sounds like a typical case of a computer user interface, where the UI simply reflects the internal implementation of the program instead of the actual use-cases from the users' point of view.
But of course, it's filled with lots of capital letters, so he must be right.