Last winter, Facebook faced a privacy policy scandal that enraged millions of users and sparked one of the first significant discussions about the business ethics of social networking giants.
The site quietly changed their Terms of Use – policies that all current users agree to upon signing up – so quietly that no one knew, at least for a while. When it was discovered that Facebook’s new policies granted the site added rights to user information, including the ability to share them with 3rd party users, there was an understandable uproar.
Though Facebook quickly rescinded the changes, articles such as the Consumerist.com post titled “Facebook's New Terms Of Service: 'We Can Do Anything We Want With Your Content. Forever,’” shocked the 175 million users at the time and Facebook has been under close moderation since.
However, it seems they struck again. Only roughly 14 months later, Facebook has again discreetly changed their policies, hoping that users don’t notice.
Often ethics conflict with profits, and that is again the case with the Facebook situation. Because Facebook’s business is based on advertising, by changing the policies and privacy settings frequently, that opens up user information to the whole web.
For the most part, advertising is harmless. But as discussed in my last post, giving too much information on the Internet, especially when you are unaware you are doing so, can be very dangerous.
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