Let’s face it, the concept of privacy does not exist on the web. That’s already a given. Your friends knows that, your mom knows that, even our dog knows that. However, I don’t think people realize just how much they are giving away and for what. And this is where Facebook comes in: it’s the gleaming, shimmering example how much of a cesspool of privacy problems the web can be. To their credit, much has changed since then, but few issues still remains. The biggest of all is just how much of personal and private information third-party apps can collect about you. A seemingly innocent game of Facebook poker or scrabble might not seem innocent once they start scraping your personal data without you, or Facebook knowing. This might sound hypocritical since Google et al. essentially does the same, but you’d imagine that a sole web application that harbours that much personal information might be a little more considerate and upfront about what it does to the drunken pictures you post on your page.
Thus, while Facebook continually overhauls its policy, here are some tips on how to defend yourself against the seemingly losing battle for right of privacy. Thus, you shouldn’t be surprised the next time you login to Facebook and see a picture of yourself plastered in a dating advertisment. You’ve been warned. As for me, I’m still staying away from Facebook…but that’s probably because I’m just lazy.
Filed under: web, Facebook, nonexistent, privacy
