<h1 class="ec-blog-fly-title">Facebook and privacy</h1>
<h3 class="ec-blog-headline">
Walking the tightrope </h3>
<p class="ec-blog-info">
<a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/11/facebook-and-privacy?fsrc=nlw|mgt|11-30-2011|management_thinking">http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/11/facebook-and-privacy?fsrc=nlw|mgt|11-30-2011|management_thinking</a></p>
<p class="ec-blog-info">Nov 29th 2011, 21:44 by M.G. | SAN FRANCISCO </p>
<div class="ec-blog-body">
<p class="MsoNormal">A
FEW years ago, Facebook was forced to retreat from a new service called
Beacon. It tracked what the social network’s users were doing elsewhere
on the web—which caused a huge fuss because of the loss of personal
privacy. At the time, Facebook promised to make strenuous efforts to
better protect people’s information.</p><p class="MsoNormal">But
apparently the firm has not been trying very hard. On November 29th
America’s Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released the results of an
investigation it had conducted of Facebook. They showed that the world's
biggest social network, which now boasts more than 800m users, has been
making information public that it had pledged to keep private.</p><p><span> </span>The
FTC’s findings come at a sensitive time for Facebook, which is
preparing for an initial public offering (IPO) that is almost certain to
take place next year. Some <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203935604577066773790883672.html">recent reports</a>
have speculated that the firm may seek a listing as early as next
spring, and that it will try to raise a whopping $10 billion in an IPO
that would value it at $100 billion. To clear the way for an offering,
Facebook badly needs to resolve some of the regulatory tussles over
privacy that it has become embroiled in.<span> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal">Hence
the FTC's announcement, which came as part of a settlement struck
between the commission and Facebook. The FTC’s investigation highlighted
a litany of instances in which the social network had deceived its
users. In what is perhaps the most damning of the findings, the agency
documents that Facebook has been sharing people’s personal information
with advertisers—a practice its senior executives have repeatedly sworn
it does not indulge in. The FTC also says that the firm failed to make
photos and videos on deactivated and deleted user accounts inaccessible
after promising to do so.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">The settlement
imposes a number of sanctions on Facebook. The company has agreed, among
other things, to an external audit of its privacy policies and
practices every two years for the next 20 years. And it has agreed to
henceforth seek users’ permission before making any changes that
override existing privacy settings. (In the past, the company often
introduced changes that made more data public by default, forcing people
to “opt out” in order to keep their information private.)</p> <p class="MsoNormal">In a bid to minimise the fallout from this latest debacle, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s boss, took to <a href="http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=10150378701937131">the company’s blog</a>
to apologise for the network’s failings and to claim that Facebook has
had “a good history of providing transparency and control” over users’
information. Critics beg to differ. “Zuckerberg is walking a privacy
tightrope” by trying to serve both advertisers and users, says one
sceptical privacy activist. “Sooner or later he is bound to trip up
badly.”</p> </div>