Entries Tagged 'Facebook' ↓
October 28th, 2011 | Facebook, Online Reputation Management, Parenting, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about toddlers on Facebook, Facebook’s new “trusted friends” security feature, and how some healthcare workers are violating patient privacy by posting information on social networking sites.
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Psychologist Andrea Bonior has an interesting article on the Huffington Post about the downside of creating a Facebook profile for your toddler. Bonior argues that there are privacy concerns, issues about the child’s lack of consent, and the potential for future resentment. The article is a great read for any new parents who want to create social media accounts for their kids.
Facebook just introduced an interesting new security feature. TIME’s Techland blog explains: “Facebook just announced a new feature called Trusted Friends, which uses—surprise, surprise—your social network to log you back in if you forget your password. This is how it works: First, you pick five Facebook friends you trust. If you get locked out, you can arrange it so those friends get a code. Afterwards, call them, collect three of the codes, enter them, and voila—you’re back in business. Facebook likens it “to giving a house key to your friends when you go on vacation.”
A new UK report reveals that “private records belonging to ill and vulnerable patients were breached more than 800 times over the last five years by nurses, doctors and administrative staff at 152 NHS trusts and hospitals.” In many cases, these breaches came via social media, where workers posted information about patients and sometimes photos.
October 27th, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Online Reputation Management, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about Facebook affecting students from getting jobs, a potential privacy flaw in Skype, and info from Google’s biannual transparency report.
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According to a new report from the Information Commissioners Office, “four out of 10 students (42 per cent) are worried that personal details they have shared on social networking sites, such as Facebook, as well as elsewhere online, could blight their chances of getting a job… The ICO study has been released to coincide with the launch of its new ‘Student Brand Ambassador’ campaign – a nationwide project aimed at raising young people’s awareness of information rights.”
According to Google’s biannual transparency report, the company has seen a sharp rise in takedown requests from police and other government agencies. The Guardian reports that these demands “formed part of a 70% rise in takedown requests from the US government or police.” The report also revealed that the “US demanded private information about more than 11,000 Google users between January and June this year.”
According to Keith Ross, a professor of computer science at the Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Skype’s default settings leave users open to having their IP addresses tracked. According to Ross, “if you have Skype running in your laptop, then I or any other attacker can inconspicuously call you, obtain your current IP address and your current location without you ever knowing about it.”
October 26th, 2011 | Facebook, Legal Issues, Online Reputation Management, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about a new social start-up, why oversharing and privacy don’t go hand-in-hand, the ongoing investigation into Facebook’s alleged “shadow profiles,” and how one Austrian law student’s efforts to access his Facebook data have created international press coverage.
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A new Internet company hopes to take on Facebook and Google+ by painting the companies as corporate giants interested only in snatching user data. Quoting CNN, the website, called Upthink, hopes “to capitalize on frustrations with the social networking giant, not to mention some of the anti-corporate sentiment bubbling up on Wall Street and beyond.” The start-up is similar to Diaspora, a self-proclaimed privacy-centric alternative to Facebook that launched to much fanfare last year.
In an op-ed for NJ.com, Carl Golden writes that the way people overshare online is at odds with a society that desires personal privacy. Quoting the op-ed: “In the electronic communication world in which we live, nothing remains confidential for very long and only the foolhardy believe it is. A secret, as has been said, remains a secret only for as long as it takes one person to tell another. And, in the case of social media, once it’s exposed, it’s out there forever no matter how many times or how frantically someone hits the delete button.”
Fox News reports that “privacy watchdogs began an on-site investigation Tuesday of Facebook’s regional office in Ireland, following sensational accusations that the company is creating extensive ‘shadow profiles’ of non-users.” Facebook has denied the claims and is cooperating with the investigation.
The AP has an interesting report on one Austrian law student’s efforts to show how much data Facebook collects and stores about users online. Quoting the article, “Max Schrems wasn’t sure what he would get when he asked Facebook to send him a record of his personal data from three years of using the site. What the 24-year-old Austrian law student didn’t expect, though, was 1,222 pages of data on a CD. It included chats he had deleted more than a year ago, ‘pokes dating back to 2008, invitations to which he had never responded, let alone attended, and hundreds of other details.”
October 25th, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Online Reputation Management, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, the FTC wraps up its settlement against Google for the company’s ill-fated Buzz service. Also, we talk about online tracking, Facebook’s stance on search, and how to look good on LinkedIn.
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Chloe Albanesius at PCMag.com writes that “the Federal Trade Commission has finalized a settlement with Google over its Buzz social-networking feature, which requires the search giant to implement privacy safeguards and submit to regular audits.” As Google continues to push its new social network Google+ into competition with Facebook, the company would be smart to look back to the mistakes of Buzz.
Someone is Always Tracking You Online
This article from the Calgary Herald discusses how advanced Internet tracking technology makes it difficult for Internet users to avoid being tracked, even when they’re offline. The author suggests that the only solution to this problem is privacy tools for consumers. Quoting the article, “It seems the tools to control our digital privacy and protect valuable personal data are not in our hands. Whether we use such tools or not is another matter, but the idea of designing privacy controls into digital products or online services is at the very least an appropriate consideration.”
Ethan Beard, the director of the Facebook Platform, recently criticized Google and other search engines for getting search wrong. According to the Telegraph, Beard “said that search needed to go social so that people could get really good product recommendations from their most trusted sources, their friends, as well links to sites where they can buy the items.” This is part of Facebook’s search strategy, as seen in the company’s recent shift to add streaming content from third-party apps into user profiles.
LinkedIn can be a great personal branding and networking tool, but only if it’s used correctly. This article from InformationWeek offers nine tips from hiring managers and executives on how to use LinkedIn effectively.
October 24th, 2011 | Facebook, Legal Issues, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about the ECPA, Facebook privacy, and using Facebook for recruiting.
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Twenty-five years ago Friday, President Reagan signed the Electronic Communications Privacy Act into law. Since then, the bill has remained relatively unchanged despite tremendous advances in digital technology. This article from Wired.com discusses the ECPA and how the language in the law allows police to access e-mail data without a warrant if its at least six months old. Moreover, because of the wording of the law, the ECPA allows access to any content in “the cloud” if it’s six months old via a government subpoena.
A portion of Facebook users are becoming concerned about their privacy online and are turning to third-party apps to protect their information. According to the Daily Mail, “Facebook Disconnect – a browser extension which prevents Facebook ‘seeing’ which other sites you visit online – has been downloaded 152,000 times. The software works in Google’s Chrome browser and automatically blocks web traffic between other sites and Facebook, so the social network can no longer ‘look at’ your browsing history.”
Some Facebook users are complaining that a glitch in the site is sending out unwanted friend requests, but the more likely scenario is that they downloaded a rogue Facebook app that is using their account to try and spread spam messages. This safety issue underlies why it’s important to only download trustworthy third-party apps.
This article from the Wall Street Journal discusses how independent developers are tapping into Facebook to build networking and recruiting tools. While Facebook hasn’t been a direct competitor with professional networking website LinkedIn, independent apps like BranchOut demonstrate how the site could become a powerful tool for recruiters looking to connect with the ideal job candidate. Conversely, there are privacy concerns among users who believe that their profiles shouldn’t be accessible to recruiters.
