Here's a question: exactly what are you worried about with regard to online privacy as it relates to Facebook? Specifically, what are you worried will happen to you? This is not a rhetorical question. I really want to know.
I’m as antsy as anyone about Facebook privacy. In fact probably more so. I never, EVER use Facebook to log into anything other than Facebook. I have only once even used one of those Facebook apps that warn me about all the things it’s going to know about me if I do so (for the record, it was boring and totally not worth it in the first place). I’m only a “Fan” of two things: a local pub I frequent with friends and... wait for it... Apple. Of course I’ve turned all my privacy settings up to eleven.
And yet, this is all truly just paranoia. Because the fact is, I can’t name a single, prospective scenario that I’m actually worried about happening to me were I to do any of those things. Hence my question: what, specifically, should I be worried will happen to me as a result of Facebook’s “abuse” of my data?
To be clear, I’m not talking here about the many complaints about Facebook being either unclear, deliberately confusing or full-on misleading about what user data is public and what is private, and to whom. The implications of that are obvious, and I can think of a lot of truly damaging consequences as a result of non “friends” seeing something that was intended only for a select group of people. I’m talking about what information does Facebook have about me, and what information does it provide, either anonymously or with personally identifying information, to it’s “partners?” I’m talking about kind of thing that lawsuits such as this seem to be attacking:
...a class action lawsuit has been filed in San Jose, California alleging that Facebook unlawfully continued to track users’ Web browsing after they logged out of the service.
Yes, this kind of thing creeps me out. Even if they’re doing it when I’m explicitly logged in. And I can only assume that the big worry is about selling that data to companies. But what, exactly, once companies know where I [radacted] and about my [redacted] and having access to all the [redacted], [redacted] and [redacted] I’ve managed to [redacted], should I be worried about actually happening to me? This is what I’d like to know.
Anybody?
Since I don’t do comments, you can reach me at Tee Oh Em at mediabahn dot com.