Facebook has never been too overly concerned about privacy, which is why they are always in the news about it. With the progression to even more intrusive policies with their new Open Graph plans, this doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better. You know Facebook tracks you. They have for ages. But did you know that they have about 800 pages of information about their average user?
Courtesy of www.mashable.com
That’s 800 pages of personal information about your life, available for use. Social media and the pursuit of a fully customized online user experience, requires some sacrifices in the privacy department. It’s only when they’ve learned everything about you, that they can start selling you stuff you really want. It’s customer profiling, and it’s the future of sales on the internet.
Intimidating or Progressive?
It’s never nice when strange people can predict your behavior, or influence it – based on some document you’ve never seen before. In Europe, there’s a law that let’s you see any stored info about yourself. That’s how this 800 page debacle was exposed. In this document there are 57 subsections, each detailing a part of your Facebook behavior, preferences or movements on the site.
Here are a few things Facebook notices about your behavior:
- All personal information, naturally – including name, address, phone numbers, gender, relationships, email addresses, credit cards, and all transactions performed on the site.
- It records all of your chat messages, even the ones you delete.
- It tracks how you use Facebook, which PC’s, phones or alternative devices you use and what their details are.
- It records who has poked you, and who you’ve poked since you signed up.
- It lists which events you’ve been to, when you’ve been invited and your choices in whether to go or not.
- Facebook tracks who you ‘friend’ and who you ‘de-friend,’ on your profile.
- It lists details about the apps you use, and even tracks your behavior through cookies when you’re NOT logged into Facebook.
Granted, Facebook is collecting this information to form a profile on you. It’s not doing it for any nefarious reasons, as certain alarmists would have you believe. Facebook is simply moving towards open sharing – which has no room for privacy. If you don’t want it to be online, don’t put it there. In the future, you’ll surf the net and will only have to look at ads and messages that are relevant to your tastes.
Courtesy of forbes.com
It’s a grand data mining expedition, and it can only end up helping you, the consumer, buy more of the things you like. It’s not so bad when you put it that way now is it? At the end of the day it still boils down to choice. If you don’t want to buy a new vacuum cleaner, you don’t have to. No matter how many sneaky messages are inserted into your daily surf time, prompting you to do it.
Yes, Facebook has 800 pages of information about each and every one of us. And there will always be those that are terrified by this prospect. But the social internet is not about privacy. It’s about sharing, connecting and consuming. If Facebook can improve the user experience for us, we say go ahead!
Do you think Facebook is crossing the privacy line? Tell us your opinion about these 800 page profiles!
That’s pretty spooky for sure, but I agree. I had this discussion with my kids the other day and it basically comes down to this. If you don’t want the world to see it, don’t put it on Facebook. I can’t properly attribute the phrase, but it’s something like “Live your life as if the whole world is watching”. As it turns out…they are!
Mark
@Mark – Excellent advice that everyone should really be taking seriously now! Thanks for reading (and for warning your kids).
This is common sense stuff. And ironically the first comment box is a Facebook input box lol.
@MD – We’re not saying it’s bad, it just doesn’t hurt to be aware of it! Thanks for reading
It’s okay that they do gathering data according to our likes or taste. But it ain’t cool anyway in terms of storing our deleted messages. I just wish that they are not getting something from it. Thanks for raising awareness on this issue.
@Andreas, A lot of people are up in arms about it – I mean who wants some Faceless corporation to know your private details? All we can do is keep watching them, and continually raise awareness about the sort of things they do. That way, no one will get hurt. Theoretically!