I'm not quite sure how I feel about this.
Facebook got a facelift [rimshot] last night (story with details on Techcrunch). There are some good changes, notably the ability to collapse sections you don't really care about. But what is big news is also a little troubling…
The new Facebook home page has a newsfeed section which tracks what the people on your friends list are doing, at a very granular level. Things it tracks include…
- The BE-friending, DE-friending, making and breaking up of relationships
- Adding or Removing Group Membership.
- Changes to your status.
- Additions, deletions, and changes to your books, movies, and TV-Show changes.
- Your RSVPs to Events.
A quick email out to my student staff and the responses tells me that users aren't necessarily aware of the privacy concerns, their implications, and what control they have over them.
Wow. That is way TMI. That is pretty scary. Now to limit myself in using facebook.
I just looked…that is too creepy. I wonder if people can still see all that when you block your profile?
I don't like it. Is there a way to prevent your friends from seeing this info?
It looks like a good idea is to restrict everything to friends – it looks like the default is to let Everyone or Friend-of-Friends to see everything.
The
"My Account" and
"My Privacy" settings are on the right-hand side. Go through each setting on your networks and make everything "restricted" and "friends only". It's also a good idea to review the
TOS (Terms of Service) which was updated today. Based on what I see in the TOS, they do have a pretty good idea of privacy control.
There's only one issue I take make objection to – why are users defaulted to allowing everyone to see everything? The American idea of individualism and privacy, or more appropriately, my idea of individualism and privacy is that everything should be transparent about one's personal, professional, and private life, but that I should be able to have the choice as to who I let to see what. I would much rather it be phrased as allowing to "opt-in" friends who I chose to see my profile, with the default being private, rather than having everything be public, and only allowed to blacklist individuals.
Tags: Facebook
This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 5th, 2006 at 7:57 am and is filed under Metablogging, Misc., Privacy, Webculture.
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