Yup i knew all along the data mining going on at facebook, just like every other single site out there on the internet? I've got little incentive to drop facebook from my daily browsing habits considering if they feel my bowel movements, smoke breaks at work or horrible love of food which makes me a WMD unto myself then hey, more power to them to waste the CPU time and hard drive space to keep tabs on it. What good is the CIA going to do with the minutia of my day to day life that is so frightening that I should stop using facebook altogether and give up contact with the friends who moved away after college?

Thanks for posting the video, Sh1fty.

I see it has been out for over a year, but I had never seen it. I'm especially fascinated by the disclosure or "Magic Lantern" found in the Wiki you posted. I had never heard of that before.

I'd also recommend re-naming the Thread Title to something like "The Danger of Facebook", as, at first glance, I thought you were just looking to find people to "friend" you on Facebook from ATS. Just a thought

[edit on 3/7/09 by StonyJ]

Where is the difference between a site like facebook and myspace or any other personal public access listing website??

There isnt any difference.

With any of them, what info they have is what you give them.


Cheers!!!!

Of course you can also turn the game board around and feed them false information...

In any case...these sites prey on peoples need to feel important and liked...a need for which they are willing to give up their privacy entirely.

Ah, the infamous Facebook.

It's not important whether it is government funded/supported/owned or not. What's important; is that it is a place where people have grown far too comfortable in regards to putting up information about themselves.

Whilst you may think it's alright to start an account, list your friends, put up your picture, list your hobbies, post comments, etc.. it's would not be hard at all for any government agency to access your info.. and please don't be naive by saying; "but you can privatize".. I think that even the regular NSA hacker would laugh at that comment.

You may ask; "well, so what, they got info on me, so what?".. so what, is that this information can be used against you somehow.

I remember the days when putting one's info on the net was a taboo. Now you got perverts and predators whom prey on such people.

Just be careful folks, Facebook were very quiet about their recent notorious T&C change. They now own anything you put on your account, even if you suddenly decide to call it quits. The fact that they didn't publicly inform everyone about this, the minute they made this change, should be suspicious enough as it is.

The thing is, I don't even get what anyone sees in Facebook in the first place. Absolutely nothing special about it. Getting reacquainted with people you've always hated anyways? ..well ..enjoy.

I didn't know officially about the data mining but I assumed it. I went to high school in the 60's and conspiracy was my middle name! We assumed our phones were bugged, letters were probably monitored. Electronic bugging was a standard joke. You never knew when it might happen so I've never assumed privacy in public situations. I don't assume privacy of my emails. I certainly don't assume privacy with a free service like facebook. I like facebook because you really can sometimes find people you've lost touch with and it's fun to see the little updates people put in. I like to send people digital plants from my lil green patch. I don't care if they know who my friends are. no secret, or family members since that is pubic knowledge. I put no personal detail in except the day (not year) of my birthday and I think I put down the city I live in. That's it. no favorite books or movies or anything, though it would be laughably easy to for anybody official to combine my google searches with my netflix account and they'd know a lot. They don't need facebook to know everything. But if anybody has bothered to do all that searching of the trails I leave, they surely wouldn't live long to tell about it because THEY WOULD DIE OF BOREDOM.There's really nothing to see. I doubt if Facebook data mining is used for anything but advertising opportunities and we are already inundated with those. Sadly I haven't even filled in detail on my ATS account but it's a habit you know. I just don't do it.

I would say it's no different from this site. Of course it's just that in Facebook or Myspace you can chose to share your personal info & pics thinking you're safe. Over here you can post whatever you like thinking you're safe

Wow, that is just creepy. There is nothing of mine on Facebook that I have a problem with anybody knowing about; when I use Facebook I know fully well that the whole world can see what I am up to. But knowing that there are ties to this organization gives me a yucky feeling about the whole thing.

And knowing what the disseminated-but-still-operational branches of the IAO are up to is very uncomfortable. "Total Information Awareness" is another way of saying "Omniscience". This is what they are trying to achieve; to be God? Makes the image of the all-seeing eye (which is part of their logo) even creepier.

Scary.

[edit on 7-3-2009 by OuttaHere]

The funny part of this is: not one person will delete their facebook after viewing this, unless you're the hardest of conspiracy theorists. Think about it: People have this urge to know what everyone else is doing; to find out what is "cool"; to find out what They themselves should be doing to fit in. Places like facebook and myspace are heaven for lazy people that can't get out and meet people on their own. Let's not even start on E harmony.

No offence, but a quick search brought up many, many Facebook/MySpace pages that are about how the government/NWO/PTB/whoever is using these website to monitor everything you do and has a database for all of the information/pictures that you post.

Personally, I have both a MySpace and a Facebook, but I am careful about what I put on either. I have yet to watch the video that was posted, but it is on my to-do list. It honestly surprises me how many of my friends will put absoltuly everything on their sites. They'd probably put up their social security numbers if it became the norm.

Originally posted by Skyfloating
In any case...these sites prey on peoples need to feel important and liked...a need for which they are willing to give up their privacy entirely.

While I agree to some extent with your statement, I also believe that Facebook and sites like it provide a great forum for people who aren't afraid to hide behind anonymity as well as those who simply wish to reconnect with their past.

Facebook can work against us but also for us.
A good way would be.
They can use their marketing data mining and start making commercial products that we like and want.

Bad side is, if you get into trouble, your whole folder of your life is one click away.

My facebook has information you can find anywhere else on the internet about me. I'm not anonymous and it is the best way for me to do what I do. Am I worried they'll get info on me? I'm an immigrant, they have ALL of my info.

Originally posted by Skyfloating
Of course you can also turn the game board around and feed them false information...

In any case...these sites prey on peoples need to feel important and liked...a need for which they are willing to give up their privacy entirely.

Isnt it ironic that many these days who are so concerned about privacy, would be willing to hand over their personal information on such sites just to feel important or liked?

Isnt that a self inflictive disaster?

Which ones are the first to cry wolf about privacy invasion?

Yet I hear people on their cell phones while standing in line at a grocery check out or in the isles or walking down the street, saying stuff of a private nature yet everyone within a 20 foot radious hears that private material, to which it is not difficult to determine what the conversation would be about.

Humans are funny creatures..arent we.



Cheers!!!!

I dont use facebook but I do have a myspace account.
Im not very active on it though and I have very little personal information on it.
The only reason I created the account was to look up a couple of old friends and to send and receive messages to my daughter when she is at her moms.
I did go to the face book website to start an account one day but when it asked for my email address and password so it could search my address book for friends who may be members, I said no thanks.
I've always thought both sites were either started/ran or supported by some nosy government agency, CIA, FBI or NSA.
Ive always thought that it was very strange that just a couple of years ago EVERYONE screamed about internet safety and anonymity but now its perfectly acceptable for people, including children, to advertise their full names, ages and even the schools they go to on a public site.
Both of these sites are a governments wet dream and people are very naive if they believe that the they dont use these sites to locate and gather information on people.

[size=6]I have never had a face book, I do have myspace but only few selected people can view my page, I think any social sites like that can be very dangerous if used improperly, I have noticed that several young girls like my cousins have put suggestive pictures of themselves and they don't even set their page to private I think it pathetic and starving for attention, but these kids do not realize how many perverts are out there looking for that kind of thing. the government tracks all of our info no matter what we do, we may seem irrelevant in our minds but certain info that we put on there is used for demographic and other reasons that we of course can not know!![/size]

I have facebook, but keep my friendlist under 100, and only people I know or have known personally.

I have a fairly large extended family, and I moved around a lot growing up so it's great to keep in contact with old friends. Not to mention the fact that I have a fairly small, closeknit group of friends and Facebook is really the only place we can all get together as we live all over the country currently.

I'm also sort of an amature (very amature) photographer and take nature hikes in the summer so I use it to post various snapshots.

I can understand how valuable it can be as a tool for a person or organization to track you down using Facebook, but the majority of your information is only accessable if you're 'Friended' with that individual. I don't post any overly personal information about myself, don't keep a blog or anything of the sort.

I see people recording their every movement via Facebook and it shocks me, they're either very stupid or very nieve.

In short, I think Facebook is a valuable tool but should be used with disgression. Most people have "Friended" people whom they don't even know personally, and have no idea of their motives.



[edit on 7-3-2009 by Monger]

I think the real issue between invasion of privacy and posting all your personal stuff is choice. If you choose to post your stuff or have private telephone conversations in public, you've made a choice. It is voluntary. When someplace is bugged or your email monitored, that's an invasion of privacy. You didn't choose it. Data mining is some kind of cross between the two. you put down the data for social reasons but they are mining it for commercial reasons. Seems unethical to me. The thing I really hate is that my BANK and my CREDIT CARD company and probably everybody else withi whom I do business SELLS my personal data. That is apparently perfectly legal but should be completely illegal and is absolutely unethical.