Facebook and Privacy – Let’s All Take a Deep Breath
Recently, I wrote about attending F8 – Facebook’s annual conference – and their new “Social Graph” strategy, including incorporating your friends’ recommendations into third party websites, etc. I talked about the pros and cons of this new initiative, but ultimately came out favoring its utility over its expense, specifically Facebook’s strategy of dominating social (and possibly all) search.
In light of everything that has happened since, man, was that a boring blog post. A whole firestorm has erupted around Facebook’s new strategy. In a nutshell, Facebook has changed their privacy policy so that they have a greater ability to share users’ pictures and private data with other websites. Not surprisingly (see below), they automatically opted-in all of their users regarding this sharing (requiring them to expressly “opt-out”), and that is really where the storm started building. Many felt that Facebook should not have included anyone unless they opted-in. Many also felt Facebook made its too complex to opt-out.
All sorts of people — commentators, entrepreneurs and now even politicians — have decided to give Facebook a good old-fashioned smack down regarding the privacy issues related to their new functionality and underlying strategy. On the entrepreneur front, one of the better publicized campaigns is called “Quit Facebook Day.” This came out of the frozen technological tundra of Toronto, where two “technologists” are attempting to have the world quit Facebook on May 31st.
Sharing similar concerns (in much more formal way) is a group of Senators from the hallowed halls of Capitol Hill. Even though they are not suggesting people quit Facebook, they are saying that Facebook’s new initiatives raise serious privacy concerns. I have republished the full letter below, as it is entertaining. But, when reading it, I couldn’t help but think, “Isn’t there a big oil spill in the Gulf?” Possibly they think Facebook will pollute the digital world more than BP? Hard to tell. Maybe that’s why I’m not a Senator.
But our fellow Canadians and noble politicians are not alone, in the last two weeks there have been dozens of articles taking Facebook and their boy wonder CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, to the privacy woodshed. Just take a look at this blog post announcing the changes, with 2,000 mostly scathing comments welcoming it (I didn’t read them all mind you). It’s all been a painful read, so I can only imagine how painful it is to be Facebook’s General Counsel right now.
As total hysteria sets in on this (when senators send letters, total hysteria is already upon us), let me offer a couple of thoughts:
Mark Zuckerberg is not Kim Jong-Il – Its funny, whenever a company becomes important to our lives, the public begins attributing all sorts of conspiratorial malice to it. Really, from some of the articles you would think that Mark Zuckerberg runs the rogue nation of Facebookistan which is exploiting state resources to destroy the world. Microsoft also experienced this when people (especially in the Valley) began referring to them as the “Death Star.” In analyzing Facebook’s actions, I suggest we start with the presumption that these are pretty good guys. My hypothesis is that Zuckerberg and his Facebook posse are simply trying to build the most effective social networking experience on the Web. As part of that, they want to make money. Sounds fairly consistent with American principals to me.- You don’t have to be on Facebook — OK, if Facebook is not a calculating dictatorship, then how can they steal my private information? Well, they can’t and that’s where everyone should take a deep breath. A couple of things: Facebook is FREE. You chose to be there. You are free to leave. “Wait a minute!” you say. “I have to be there because all of my friends are there! I use Facebook for my email and book club!” Exactly, and that’s why you need to cut Facebook some slack. They are giving you something really valuable for FREE and their new initiatives are simply trying to enhance that really valuable FREE experience for you.
- Facebook made the best choice re: the automatic opt-in — Probably 95% of Facebook’s users *want* Facebook’s new functionality and all of the personalization that goes with it. If Facebook automatically opted-out this 95%, then most would never know the functionality/personalization exists and the rest would have a tough time opting-in. This is because it is really hard for people to understand (and then implement) new functionality when it is already difficult for them to even upload pictures. You simply give it to them, they are happy, end of story. Imagine your tastiest ice cream truck (summer is on the way after all) that wants to add a free waffle cone to every order. Even though they believe that most customers would cheer this generosity, the ice cream truck requires everyone to fill out a form to receive the upgraded cone (because of the increased fat content, of course). The ice cream truck will not give out many free waffle cones.
- Facebook should make it easier to opt-out – Admittedly, I have not tried to opt-out of Facebook’s new privacy settings; but, if it is as difficult as the articles say, they should change it. Yesterday’s news reports say that Facebook is already capitulating on this point. But, again, even if they make it easier, the overwhelming majority of their users will not opt-out. Facebook was probably smart to see how many wanted to change their privacy settings before spending money on seldom-used functionality.
Facebook is sharing benign information that many want shared — Facebook is not trying to reveal your medical records, medications, old boyfriends, criminal convictions or anything else that we currently see as very private. They are simply sharing information with your network that you have already hung out for that network (and possibly the Facebook world) to see. Moreover, not everyone has the same definition of private information. Just take a look at what your 18 year old nephew chooses to share on the Web, and you can see that one size does not fit all. Facebook is trying to be responsive to a younger generation that shares almost everything. That’s not evil, that’s smart.
Because this post is getting way too long (and there is no way to break it into two posts), let me close by asking everyone to take a big breath. Privacy is a serious matter, and any business that does not take it seriously will perish. But Facebook is not attempting a home invasion here. Let’s assume they are good people who are trying to advance social networking. Let’s assume that more people want these changes than not. Let’s assume that these changes will improve all of our social networking experiences across the Web. Let’s not fault them for trying to dominate or make money.
Those assumptions paint a very different picture that does not require anyone to abandon Facebook or beg Congress to get involved. If Facebook is acting inappropriately, they will quickly become irrelevant. It’s that simple.
Can we all now get back to the oil spill in the Gulf?
Letter from U.S. Senators Schumer, Bennet, Begich and Franken (D-MN) to Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg:
Dear Mr. Zuckerberg,
We are writing to express our concern regarding recent changes to the Facebook privacy policy and the use of personal data on third party websites. While Facebook provides a valuable service to users by keeping them connected with friends and family and reconnecting them with long-lost friends and colleagues, the expansion of Facebook – both in the number of users and applications – raises new concerns for users who want to maintain control over their information. The following three changes have raised concerns:
1. Publicly available data. Facebook’s expansion of publicly available data to include a user’s current city, hometown, education, work, likes, interests, and friends has raised concerns for users who would like to have an opt-in option to share this profile information. Through the expanded use of “connections,” Facebook now obligates users to make publicly available certain parts of their profile that were previously private. If the user does not want to connect to a page with other users from their current town or university, the user will have that information deleted altogether from their profile. We appreciate that Facebook allows users to type this information into the “Bio” section of their profiles, and privatize it, but we believe that users should have more control over these very personal and very common data points. These personal details should remain private unless a user decides that he/she would like to make a connection and share this information with a community.
2. Third party data storage. Previously, Facebook allowed third-party advertisers to store profile data for 24 hours. We are concerned that recent changes allow that data to be stored indefinitely. We believe that Facebook should reverse this policy, or at a minimum require users to opt in to allowing third parties to store data for more than 24 hours.
3. Instant personalization. We appreciate that Facebook is attempting to integrate the functionality of several popular websites, and that Facebook has carefully selected its initial partners for its new “instant personalization” feature. We are concerned, however, that this feature will now allow certain third party partners to have access not only to a user’s publicly available profile information, but also to the user’s friend list and the publicly available information about those friends. As a result of the other changes noted above, this class of information now includes significant and personal data points that should be kept private unless the user chooses to share them. Although we are pleased that Facebook allows users to opt-out of sharing private data, many users are unaware of this option and, moreover, find it complicated and confusing to navigate. Facebook should offer users the ability to opt-in to sharing such information, instead of opting out, and should make the process for doing so more clear and coherent.
We hope that Facebook will stand by its goal of creating open and transparent communities by working to ensure that its policies protect the sensitive personal biographical data of its users and provide them with full control over their personal information. We look forward to the FTC examining this issue, but in the meantime we believe Facebook can take swift and productive steps to alleviate the concerns of its users. Providing opt-in mechanisms for information sharing instead of expecting users to go through long and complicated opt-out processes is a critical step towards maintaining clarity and transparency.
Sincerely,
U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer (D-NY)
U.S. Senator Michael Bennet (D-CO)
U.S. Senator Mark Begich (D-AK)
U.S. Senator Al Franken (D-MN)
