Facebook Privacy Problems
When you look at many in the world today, you find they are tied into a Bluetooth, Twittering, or on Facbook interacting with friends and family. Sites such as this one is constantly requesting more personal information be revealed which can, ultimately serve as a threat to privacy. Facebook indicates that it requests this info in order to provide more relevant advertisements based on what users are actually interested in knowing more about.
For years people have continued to question whether or not “giving up” such information is necessary, and opinions vary as much as the websites themselves. People against this method want additional security measures, but people who own the websites think the personal info is vital to keeping the users satisfied with relevant advertisements.
One thing that many people are unaware of is that many sites also use IP tracking which means they can track not only your exact location, but who you are online with, and what you are saying. This particular website nobull-ip-tracking.com/14/index.htm, along with plenty more, does just that.
With new lawsuits being filed on a daily basis, how to protect individual rights on the Internet while not violating freedom of speech or the right of a person to reveal as much about themselves as they wish, has yet to be resolved. Facebook has been particularly targeted in this war due to the methods they use to protect users’ privacy.
The website is constantly reconfiguring space and allowing access to information even on “privacy blocked” participants. As a result, the National Trade Commission has imposed new regulations that relate to the types of changes Facebook can make which has limited their ability to improve their product.
As one of the largest social websites on the Internet, Facebook serves over 500 million users monthly. As such, many changes proposed by the company to keep up not only with the volume, but ever-changing legal mandates, has resulted in site problems which were unanticipated. Things like an unclear interface and news feed tied personal information into public forums that led to much criticism. What many fail to understand is that once personal information is placed on the Internet, it is vulnerable to accessibility.
An illustration of this is the Beacon Advertising System, which was used to document personal info of anyone who performed an Internet-based search. Then, people on a distribution list would get an email saying something to the effect, “Check out Johny’s favorite site.” A URL would then take you DIRECTLY to the same site that YOU visited! A lot of people on Facebook believed that this betrayed their privacy since not everyone wants their family and friends to know what he or she is searching on the web. Fortunately, Facebook dropped this service, but not before the damage was done.
Facebook, along with most other social networking websites, put a great deal of importance on the privacy of their users; however, in the end, the users have to be accountable for what information they put on the site that could be exposed. Social networking has become the norm and the Internet needs to find a way to cope with ever-increasing demands. Although many do their best, these sites will NEVER protect us completely, we should ALWAYS be mindful of just what information we post about ourselves – it could very easily wind up in the WRONG HANDS!
