Facebook is growing (and growing, and growing), and the larger they get, the more the spotlight is shone on the more negative aspects of both the social networking site, and social networking as a whole. The most pressing complaint from users and privacy advocacy groups alike has been the often inadequate security featured on the site.
It is not at all uncommon to find that someone has forgotten to log out, or just didn’t log out properly on a public computer or device. Rather than time out, these log in will often remain for at least a few hours, which will result is an account hijack with embarrassing – or even serious – consequences for the user of the account. Sites like Lamebook are filled with examples of this, and many of us know friends or family who have had personal details stolen from private messages posted on statuses, or their account locked.
Facebook is now coming out with a feature they hope will eliminate this. It is a central control listed withing your account settings, with will allow you to see details of where you last logged in, an approximate location of that log in (though not too specific), and whether or not your log in is still active. You can then shut off that log in from a remote location, either from your computer, another computer, or a mobile device.
This adds to the other feature that was released a few months, which allows users to authorize what devices can be used to log in. If an unauthorized device is used to attempt access, you are immediately alerted.
These are both pretty cool, and should offer a certain amount of protection for users. However, it comes far from fixing the many privacy issues facing the social networking giant, especially since many of those problems arise from the site itself. For example, users are regularly used as free marketing research, and information is sold to third parties.
The ‘like’ buttons all over the web (you can’t get away from them) are used to show clearly to businesses and groups what the average demographic is into, and with the personal details listed in your account it gives the same information that a survey would.
Facebook also has in their user agreement a clause that allows them to use information, photos, and anything else you put on your profile for advertising. Add all of this to Google’s RealTime search, which, as I previously reported, allows people to search status messages along with your name and picture, and you can see how anonymity is being systematically eliminated on the web.
If only it weren’t all so addicting…
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