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by Glenn Caleval
Facebook has taken a major swing at privacy concerns and hit a home run for user rights according to the Secure Surfing Organization.
Instead of offering the litany of excuses and confusion that is the standard fare of the old boys of the internet, Facebook has agreed that the findings of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada are legitimate and will be fully addressed.We are very impressed that Facebook has decided to implement the ability for users to actually delete their accounts, with a commitment to erase any information in the account including personal information, friends information, photos and so on.
This is a major privacy concern for individuals, but more nefariously for the friends and contacts of individuals. The inability to delete accounts means the providers (Facebook, WindowsLive and so on) retain the personal information of third-parties without the consent of those third parties. A compromise of privacy on a grand scale is inherent in this refusal to delete accounts.
Facebook is to be commended to be the first major service to accept this risk and actively to move to end it.
The more difficult and equally important action Facebook will be taking over the next year is to change the way Facebook Apps interact with user privacy. The current system, that requires a blank cheque of access to personal information by all apps, is wholly unnecessary and poses draconian privacy risks.
Facebook will be implementing user-choice systems to all the user to choose exactly what information they are willing to supply any Facebook app, allowing, for example to share you own information but not the information of your friends.
This change will involve major programming work by Facebook and does represent a very significant commitment of resources. They have to recode the interface system between Facebook and a million application providers.
This is not a small task and we believe glitches should be expected. If there are some missteps, or interferences with functionality through the redeployment, we encourage users to cut Facebook a little slack.
On the contrary, if we want user rights to be respected by other companies, we need to ensure our appreciation of Facebook’s changes to a user rights platform receives as much support and thanks as possible.
Way to go Facebook.
