Facebook violates Canadian privacy law

http://news.sympatico.msn.ctv.ca/abc/home/contentposting.aspx?isfa=1&feedname=CTV-TOPSTORIES_V3&showbyline=True&date=true&newsitemid=CTVNews%2f20090716%2ffacebook_watchdog_090716


The privacy commissioner launched a probe of Facebook's privacy practices in response to a complaint last year from the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic.

"Canadians truly need to know what they are getting into when joining Facebook and should be able to control the information they share," said Stoddart at a news conference on Thursday. "We found serious privacy gaps in the way the site operates."

Facebook, which has nearly 12 million Canadian users, allows people to keep in touch with friends and family by updating their personal pages with fresh messages and photos.

The investigation into its privacy practices has been ongoing for 13 months, and Facebook is working with Canada's privacy office to address some concerns.

"We urge Facebook to implement all of our recommendations to further enhance their site, ensure they are in compliance with privacy law, and ultimately show themselves as models of privacy," says Assistant Commissioner Elizabeth Denham, who led the investigation on behalf of Canada's privacy office.

The four areas of concern that Facebook has not yet agreed to address are:

* The excessive amount of personal user information given to third party application developers from all around the world.
* The inability of a user to delete their account, which would eliminate their personal information from Facebook servers permanently. Currently, users can only deactivate their account.
* The lack of information provided to users about how their friends can gain access to their personal information.
* The fact that personal information about non-users is collected and used within Facebook.

Stoddart was confident Facebook would address some of the concerns, telling CTV News Channel she expected "to make headway in the next 30 days."

I read this today also, it's amazing to me how much more stringent privacy rules are in other countries, it's surprising that this issue doesnt come up more often. I believe the provacy laws are even more stringent in Germany... I was astounded by the stat that 1 in 3 canadaians are on facebook.

Pez wrote:I read this today also, it's amazing to me how much more stringent privacy rules are in other countries, it's surprising that this issue doesnt come up more often. I believe the provacy laws are even more stringent in Germany... I was astounded by the stat that 1 in 3 canadaians are on facebook.

I didn't know about the 1 in 3 stat. I've never set up a facebook account.

someday someone will commit a serious crime and their excuse will be what they saw on a facebook page that gave way too much accurate personal info..then america will join canada in demanding better privacy guidelines.

An update on the Facebook issue.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090827/national/facebook_privacy

By The Canadian Press

OTTAWA - Facebook has addressed the privacy commissioner's concerns about its popular social networking site.

Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart said she's "very pleased" with the way the company handled her complaints.

She was concerned that the company held on to personal information indefinitely - even after people closed their accounts - and that it shared users' information with almost one million third-party developers of Facebook applications.

i dont like that they hold on to your info "forever"..people should have the right to delete their account.

but then i dont do facebook either.

Ever since I read that here, it has only strengthened my original decision not to join.