Judges Approves $9.5 Million Facebook ‘Beacon’ Accord: Via Threat Level.

A federal judge on Wednesday approved a $9.5 million settlement to a class action lawsuit challenging Facebook’s program that monitored and published what users of the social networking site were buying or renting from Blockbuster, Overstock and other locations.

The case concerned allegations Facebook’s now defunct “Beacon” program breached federal wiretap and video-rental privacy laws. Terms of the settlement, in which Facebook denied any wrongdoing, require the site to finance what the deal calls a “Digital Trust Fund” that would issue more than $6 million in grants to organizations to study online privacy.

The social networking site will have a seat on the fund’s three-member board — a fact that was a big bone of contention (.pdf) in the privacy community, but one U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Jose, California, said Wednesday was immaterial.

“There has been no pervasive showing that the foundation will be a mere publicity tool for Facebook,” (.pdf) Seeborg wrote.

Seeborg gave preliminary approval to the deal last year, but finalized it Wednesday after reviewing objections. [ Read more ... ]

How Privacy Vanishes Online: Via NYT > Privacy.

Using innocuous bits of data from Web sites like Facebook and Twitter, researchers gleaned people’s names, ages and even Social Security numbers.

Yet people often dole out all kinds of personal information on the Internet that allows such identifying data to be deduced. Services like Facebook, Twitter and Flickr are oceans of personal minutiae — birthday greetings sent and received, school and work gossip, photos of family vacations, and movies watched.

Computer scientists and policy experts say that such seemingly innocuous bits of self-revelation can increasingly be collected and reassembled by computers to help create a picture of a person’s identity, sometimes down to the Social Security number.

“Technology has rendered the conventional definition of personally identifiable information obsolete,” said Maneesha Mithal, associate director of the Federal Trade Commission’s privacy division. “You can find out who an individual is without it.” [ Read more ... ]

Undercover Feds on Social Networking Sites Raise Questions: Via Threat Level.

The next time someone ties to “friend” you on Facebook, it may turn out to be an undercover fed looking to examine your private messages and photos, or surveil your friends and family, according to an internal Justice Department document obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The 33-page document shows that law enforcement agents from local police to the FBI and Secret Service have been logging on to MySpace and other sites undercover to communicate with suspects, read private postings and view photos and videos that are restricted to a user’s friends, according to the Associated Press.

The document also describes techniques for verifying alibis — such as checking messages posted by a suspect on Twitter disclosing his whereabouts at the time a crime was committed — and uncovering information that might point to illegal activity, such as photos depicting a suspect with expensive jewelry, a new car or even a weapon.

The document says that evidence from social networking sites can: [ Read more ... ]

FBI Uses Fake Facebook Profiles To Spy On Suspects: Via Huffington Post.

WASHINGTON — The Feds are on Facebook. And MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter, too.

U.S. law enforcement agents are following the rest of the Internet world into popular social-networking services, going undercover with false online profiles to communicate with suspects and gather private information, according to an internal Justice Department document that offers a tantalizing glimpse of issues related to privacy and crime-fighting.

Think you know who's behind that "friend" request? Think again. Your new "friend" just might be the FBI.

The document, obtained in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, makes clear that U.S. agents are already logging on surreptitiously to exchange messages with suspects, identify a target's friends or relatives and browse private information such as postings, personal photographs and video clips. [ Read more ... ]

Classmates.com’s Facebook Mimicking Prompts Privacy Suit: Via Threat Level.

The long-lost pal locating site, Classmates.com, has been hit with a class action privacy lawsuit alleging the company violated the law when it decided to make user profiles public in order to compete with Facebook.

The suit alleges that Classmates.com duped its paying customers in late January when it sent them an e-mail saying that members would have to opt-out of new Facebook and iPhone apps to keep their data private. That’s a massive change to the site’s privacy policy and violates federal and Washington State privacy and fairness laws, according to the suit (.pdf) filed in a Washington State federal district court March 5.

Classmates.com has long kept user information non-public, and only paying members can read e-mails sent to them by others, see ‘old friends’ on a map, and see who has been looking at their profile. While the site has some 3 million paying users, it’s been eclipsed by sites like Facebook and MySpace, which have more members, more public profiles and don’t charge.

In order to keep up, Classmates.com decided to make “public Classmates content available to people using a variety of sites and devices, including Facebook and the iPhone,” according to a January 30 e-mail sent to users. [ Read more ... ]

I don't bleepin' believe it - Insurers may raise your home insurance premiums if you use social networking.: Via Network World on computerworld.

From the Backspin "I don't believe it" department comes this week's top story: Insurers may raise your home insurance premiums if you use social networking.

Yep, according to Legal and General, one of the United Kingdom's biggest home insurers: "The insurance industry is aware that, with increasing acceptance of social media, the standard risk indicators may need to be reviewed. New risks and patterns in crime and claims are continually monitored to ensure the implications do not impact viable business models …. This social networking trend is clearly one that is making home insurers sit up and take note."

The rationale behind the interest in social networking can be found in L&G's "Digital Criminal Report". This document, based on a survey of "more than 2,000 social media users," found that "38% of users of sites such as Facebook and Twitter have posted status updates detailing their holiday plans and ... 33% have posted status updates saying they are away for the weekend." [ Read more ... ]

Brief Facebook glitch sent private messages to wrong users: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.

Last night, a number of Facebook users began getting hundreds of private messages and friend requests intended for other users, according to a Wall Street Journal report. While the problem was only temporary, it adds to the growing concern that Facebook doesn't do enough to ensure the privacy of its users' data. [ Read more ... ]

Opinion: Dear Facebook, it's time to act like a grown-up about security: Via Computerworld Cybercrime/Hacking News.

An open letter to Facebook from Ira Winkler, who had no luck contacting the company via conventional means.

Dear Facebook,

I appreciate your service. I really do. I'm sure that many of your 400 million active users appreciate it as well. But now that you have a market value estimated at billions of dollars, it is time for you to start acting like a grown-up company. That means you have to provide basic security for your customers. And it means responding when your customers try to contact you, as I did recently to talk about an important security issue. Do you think you will be able to hold on to 400 million users if you treat them that way, and if you put their computers at risk? I don't.

As you can see, I have had to resort to writing an open letter on Computerworld's Web site, because all other attempts to get through to you were unsuccessful. [ Read more ... ]

Facebook Adds Application Publisher Controls, But Application Privacy Holes Remain: Via ACLU of Northern California.

Facebook recently announced that it was rolling out tools that would give users more granular control over content posted via third-party applications. More flexible privacy controls are always a welcome step, but this move does not address the privacy flaws with Facebook’s third party application platform that are highlighted by our Facebook Privacy Quiz.  Please sign our petition and demand that Facebook protect your information from third party applications!

[...]

While these more granular controls are a positive step, it is important to remember that they do not address the fact that third party applications on Facebook can, by default, access almost all of the information on a user’s profile [ Read more ... ]

Banks mining social media sites for personal information: Via San Francisco News - abc7news.com .

Web users are becoming increasinly aware that companies are secretly gathering and selling the information they post on social sites like Facebook and Twitter. But now, banks may also be judging them based on their social network profile.

For the first time, banks can look pretty deeply into your private life by looking at your Facebook or other social media page and they may even consider your network of friends. The question is, "Will banks use your online persona to decide whether to give you credit?"

Personal finance expert Erica Sandberg is all over the Internet. Anyone can read about her on Facebook or LinkedIn. That's why she's very careful what she writes.

"It's very similar to standing in the middle of the park and screaming. Do you want to scream good things or do you want to scream crazy things?" she says. [ Read more ... ]

Philly authorities target Facebook, Twitter after snowball fight turns ugly: Via The Social - CNET News.

Two members of Philadelphia's city council are considering legal action against Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace in the wake of a "flash mob" earlier this week that turned violent, according to a letter sent to the city's mayor and obtained by CNET. They claim that social-media sites don't do enough to keep tabs on violence that could be organized through their communication channels.

No charges have been drawn up, in the letter the councilmembers ask the permission of Mayor Michael Nutter to "pursue the possibility" of a lawsuit. [ Read more ... ]

Why Pete Warden Should Not Release Profile Data on 215 Million Facebook Users: Via Michael Zimmer.org .

Speaking of the research ethics related to automatically harvesting public social networking data, we are confronted this week with the story of Pete Warden, a former Apple engineer who has spent the last six months harvesting and analyzing data from some 215 million public Facebook profile pages.

According to Warden, he exploited a flaw in Facebook’s architecture to access public profiles without needing to be signed in to a Facebook account, effectively avoiding being bound by Facebook’s Terms of Service preventing such automated harvesting of data. As a result, he amassed a database of names, fan pages, and lists of friends for 215 million public Facebook accounts. [ Read more ... ]

Facebook Denies ‘All Wrongdoing’ in ‘Beacon’ Data Breach: Via Threat Level.

Facebook is denying it illegally breached the privacy of its users in a proposed $9.5 million settlement to a class action challenging its program that monitored and published what users of the social-networking site were buying or renting from Blockbuster, Overstock and other locations.

To settle allegations that the social networking site’s “Beacon” program breached federal wiretap and video-rental privacy laws, Facebook is agreeing to seed what the agreement is calling a “Digital Trust Fund” that would issue more than $6 million in grants to organizations to study privacy. Facebook would have a seat on the fund’s three-member board — a move raising some eyebrows in the privacy community.

A fairness hearing on the issue is set for Feb. 26 in a San Jose, California, federal court. The judge presiding over the case, Richard Seeborg, gave preliminary approval to the deal three months ago. [ Read more ... ]

Jurors: Stop Twittering: Via Threat Level.

A federal court policy making body is belatedly entering the internet age by proposing that judges clearly inform jurors they must not electronically discuss cases they are hearing.

It’s standard procedure to inform jurors to remain mum and not conduct any research about the case until a verdict. But recent gadget use by jurors has forced the hand of the Judicial Conference, the policy making body of the U.S. federal courts.

“You may not communicate with anyone about the case on your cell phone, through e-mail, Blackberry, iPhone, text messaging, or on Twitter, through any blog or website, through any internet chat room, or by way of any other social networking websites, including Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and YouTube,” (.pdf) according to the model jury instructions the Judicial Conference released days ago to the federal judiciary. [ Read more ... ]

ShmooCon: Inside FarmVille's sinister underbelly: Via Computerworld Security News.

You love Facebook apps like FarmVille and Mafia Wars and think they're perfectly safe, right? Think again.

You see it all the time on Facebook: A friend moving on up in FarmVille. Another friend trying to expand his posse in Mafia Wars. Everyone thinks of them as harmless third-party applications, free from the crooks and cooks of cyberspace.

Unfortunately, that's not the case.

The sad fact is that these applications are susceptible to malware pushers and those looking to steal your personal information. It's not much of a stretch for hackers to impersonate people you think are trusted, fellow players, as is the case with a lot of online gaming. And the more you expose yourself, the bigger the target you become. [ Read more ... ]

Facebook Privacy, Security Fears Grow with Social Network Risks: Via Security from eWeek.

According to Sophos, 60 percent of businesses consider Facebook the riskiest social networking site, underscoring a new level of wariness for social networks at a time when a researcher from Kaspersky Lab says compromised accounts for Twitter and other sites can go for big bucks in the cyber-underworld.

Businesses are growing more concerned about the use of social networks, starting with Facebook.

According to a survey of 502 IT professionals by Sophos, businesses are seeing more malware and spam, and 60 percent of respondents put Facebook ahead of MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn as the riskiest social networking site. The statistics, which were included in Sophos' "Security Threat Report: 2010" (PDF), revealed that while 33 percent block Facebook for productivity reasons, businesses are also concerned with the prospect of spam, malware and data leakage on social networks. [ Read more ... ]

Too much info on social media aids ID thieves: Via San Francisco Chronicle.

More than half of adults 45 and older who are on social networks like Facebook could be in danger of becoming victims of identity theft or other crimes because they share too much private information, according to a study released today.

In one example, the study commissioned by a unit of credit reporting services firm Experian found that 14 percent of adults - and 20 percent of those age 60 and over - listed their full home addresses in their social media profiles.

If they then post updates from a trip, that tells thieves "no one is watching your house," said Jennifer Leuer, general manager of Experian's ProtectMyID.com. [ Read more ... ]

Michael Arrington is Wrong about Privacy, Too: Via Michael Zimmer's blog.

Responding to the brouhaha caused by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s recent proclamation that social norms on privacy have loosened, Michael Arrington (the tech blogger who was interviewing Zuckerberg at the time) has posted a piece on his blog Tech Crunch: “Ok You Luddites, Time To Chill Out On Facebook Over Privacy”

Arrington is correct that Zuckerberg never actually said that “the age of privacy is over”, and that off-line data aggregation companies like Equifax and TransUnion have been eroding privacy long before Facebook existed. However, just as Zuckerberg is wrong in his suggestion that Facebook is merely following shifting social norms regarding privacy, Arrington is wrong in his general defense of Facebook. [ Read more ... ]

Zuckerberg’s Remarks Aren’t Surprising, Nor New, Nor True: Via Michael Zimmer's blog.

There’s been quite a dust-up regarding Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s recent proclamation that social norms on privacy have changed, and that Facebook, god bless ‘em, are merely reacting to these shifting norms.

Lots has already been said about Zuckerberg’s remarks, so I’m only going to add three thoughts to the conversation: What Zuckerberg said isn’t surprising, it isn’t new, and it isn’t true.

:::

That Zuckerberg believes social norms on privacy have changed comes as no surprise because he has to believe — and proclaim — that sentiment. His entire philosophy of information centers on the fundamental belief that information wants to be shared, and that the primary goal of Facebook has been to encourage people to overcome the “hurdle” of wanting to preserve some privacy online. [ Read more ... ]

Ok You Luddites, Time To Chill Out On Facebook Over Privacy: Via Michael Arrington at TechCrunch.

The fact is that privacy is already really, really dead. Howard Lindzon nailed it the other day when he said “Equifax, Transunion, Capital One, American Express and their cousins raped our privacy,” Everything we do, everything we buy, everywhere we go is tracked and sitting in a database somewhere. Our location via our phone, or our car GPS. Our credit card transactions. Everything. Honestly, a picture of you taking a bong hit in college is mice nuts compared to the mountain of data that is gathered and exploited about every single one of us every single day. You just don’t really see that other stuff because those companies don’t like to talk about the data their gathering. [ Read more ... ]

Why Facebook's Privacy Changes are Detrimental to Users: Via Mashable.

Though Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg says that public is the new “social norm,” many members who use the social network for professional and business reasons have lost the ability to conduct certain actions privately as a result of changes made to the settings.

And despite this being a reflection and a catalyst of our social activities becoming more public through the likes of Twitter and other sites, not having the option to control certain aspects in some ways is detrimental to the way we use the site and has the potential to deter users from using the site freely. [ Read more ... ]

Zuckerberg: Facebook Is Helping People Avoid All That Unwanted Privacy: Via Tech News World.

Facebook's recent privacy overhaul, which has been roundly criticized by privacy advocates, was a response to a "new social norm," according to the social network's CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Society is evolving away from the desire to be private and toward an increasing willingness to share more personal information with more people, he said, and his company's new policies reflect that.

[...]

'We Just Went for It'

Facebook's privacy updates were motivated by its desire to reflect the most current social norms, Zuckerberg added. [ Read more ... ]

HOW TO: Erase Your Online Past [HUMOR]: Via Mashable .

These days, it’s getting tougher and tougher to keep a good name unbesmirched. Surveys indicate that as many as half of hiring managers use search engines to screen job applicants, and 1 in 10 have rejected potential employees because of damaging information on the web. Even if there’s no one out to get you, it’s likely that you’ve left your own e-trail of embarrassment: Facebook photos, blog comments, cached web pages, YouTube videos — all these things can provide the world with evidence of your previous poor judgement and wrongdoing.

Here’s how to combat that, and purge your online past.

Read Original Article:(Via Mashable.)

Rogue Marketers Can Mine Your Info on Facebook: Via Epicenter | Wired.com .

Got an e-mail list of customers or readers and want to know more about each — such as their full name, friends, gender, age, interests, location, job and education level?

Facebook has just the free feature you’re looking for, thanks to its recent privacy changes.

The hack, first publicized by blogger Max Klein, repurposes a Facebook feature that lets people find their friends on Facebook by scanning through e-mail addresses in their contact list.

But as Klein points out, a  marketer could take a list of 1,000 e-mail addresses, either legally or illegally collected — and upload those through a dummy account — which then lets the user see all the profiles created using those addresses. Given Facebook’s ubiquity and most people’s reliance on a single e-mail address, the harvest could be quite rich. [ Read more ... ]

How To Stop Facebook From Publishing Recent Activity To The News Feed: Via allfacebook.com .

Are you tired of your friends knowing about every group you’ve joined or every Facebook Page you’ve become a fan of? Do you want to RSVP for an event without your friends knowing that you are attending? Sometimes users just want to keep things private and after numerous emails in my inbox, I thought it would be useful to post a short guide on how to prevent Facebook from publishing stories about every single activity you make on the site. With the removal of news feed settings in December, many users have become confused about blocking information from their profile. This guide will tell you how!

Read Original Article:(Via allfacebook.com .)