I read somewhere that Facebook was initially funded by the CIA, or at least partially funded by them, and I know our local law enforcement agencies use it all the time to locate people.

I agree it's much more than just social networking anymore, and people should be very cautious about what they put on it.

Particularly I would caution those in the job market, as potential employee's lives are examined by those who can get them. It's a good way to lose a job if you're not careful. This I know from friends who are in hiring positions.

It does paint an interesting picture of some demographics around the country.....provided you are on facebook. One of my friends insisted that I sign up years ago....but I haven't been back since. So, I'm thinking that to get a clear picture of what goes on, it would have to be more inclusive.

But no doubt, we are getting there! Good article.

I do have to wonder how much thought the typical person puts into how much information is available to the masses and whether the typical person considers this availability of information a concern?

I am afraid that many users of social networks do not realize just what kind of private information they are putting out on the web.

Even a simple statement as "My six year old is just now learning his basic math" can say many things that you might have not intended to say.

"My six year old is just now learning basic math, means your age is somewhere between 25 and 35, that you are most likely married, and you live close to a school of some sort, more likely a high end school. It would also hint at your spouses age, and stating "my six year old" might actually hint that you have more kids referring to one by his or her age.

The point is one sentence of information can allow one to come to some logical and accurate educated predictions about ones life.

Now one must consider how much information is in their posts, your profile and even your scree name/avatar times how many sites you are on.

If someone wanted to they could come close to any information needed.

That is unless one is taking steps to fix this problem

Additionally, there are considerations that are out of one's control. Reference the article in the opening post. Programs are being developed to mine information from public profiles on a larger scale and this information is being used to "profile" areas of the country, gender, education level, etc. based (not necessarily on your profile alone) but all of one's friends and friend's of friend's extended throughout the parameters of the "mining search."

Not to mention that these inferences will be extended to people who are not even using these sites, simply by being a member of the "profile" category or location. Social sites and the information gleaned from them, now have the capacity to impact every single person, not just those who actively use it.

ed: for sp.



[edit on 14-2-2010 by LadySkadi]

I read a few weeks back that the owner of Facebook has been contributing money towards the socialist american party.

My .02

The link between Facebook and U.S government agencies presented in that Youtube video is pretty ridiculous. I’m sure if you looked hard enough you could find similar links in plenty of other big businesses.

This kind of data collection sounds like an awesome idea as long as it’s fairly generic.

S+F - This is my favourite subject.

I personally have no problem volunteering my information out to certain sites. It allows me to have opportunities and establish a cultural identity with which I can make friends and enemies.

I do have a problem with who is in control of my data though. God and angels I'm fine with - but sadly they're fictional (IMHO).

When I was back in the UK data blunders (which still haven't been cleared up) cost millions of people their personal private information. Addresses, next of kin, bank account details, date of birth...pretty much the whole shebang have been 'lost' on trains and trashcans and 'disappeared' from where they should be. So if this is the data we know about (because it's physical) then what of the data that just just copied and passed along without any one knowing?

I gave a lecture once on Facebook, it's benefits and potential problems. It was about a year ago. During the lecture I had the class pick a city that wasn't in our country and asked them to select a male or female candidate. I then hunted down through the publicly available information and found a single male who had pictures of his house and its equipment, his pet fish, his 'friends', his phone number, favourite football team, date of birth, email and fact that he was going to a 3 day rock festival 300 miles north of where he was located the following weekend. All of this was projected onto large display for the group to see. It took about 10 mins.

I put forward the idea that if we were of a criminal nature we could break into his house whilst he was away and steal all of his stuff. I asked the class how viable that option would be and they agreed it was incredibly realistic. I then put forward the idea that since we know who his mother's mother is from his status updates we could get some credit cards planned as we know his date of birth, mother's maiden name and address. We could pick up the cards when we visit his house to break in. Again, it was seen as a viable option should we have a criminal nature. Finally I said, we know his email address. Who thinks that the password will be his pet fish, football team or some other piece of information that he's volunteered?

I didn't go so far as to break into someone's email (As I'd already shown the class prior that most of their passwords were either their kids or loved ones names, pets or sports teams) but it left the group with the feeling I was aiming for. To break into a house you have to be there - but he'd given us all we needed to know on how to do it. To break into someone's entire online life you only need an email and password and you can be anywhere.

With social media being integrated more and more with third party applications one fault in our security could have all our online identity compromised and we wouldn't even be aware of it until it was too late.

URL shorteners also cause problems. With Twitter constricting us to 140 characters people use Bit.ly or some equivalent to point people to sites they think are worthy of note. These mask the target URL and are a ripe market for being exploited in the phishing market. One click from a Twitter posted link could lead you to a Facebook like page which only has the purpose of stealing your email and password. Chances are that your Facebook password is the same as your email password which further compromises security.

I think 2010 will be the year of identity theft and compromised security. No longer do scammers have to write complicated coding, they can just use the tools already available to them to help fabricate their ruse. Check YouTube for a bunch of videos telling you how to do this already - that's how easy it is that 13 year olds are propagating it.

I agree the long term problems potentially brought by Facebook should be voiced loud and focussed on by government and human rights activists. However I think a basic literacy on how to use the internet is much more important for the short term as common criminals are much more dangerous in an immediate way.

I do think Facebook (and Twitter) are government funded operations that have the potential to go awry, but as long as we hold the leash and not the other way around it can be a useful tool for a great number of things.

Cheers for letting me vent!

-m0r

The only reason I joined Facebook was to access a relative's page. The next day, I logged in to FB and I was horrified to see thumbnail photos of the people from my e-mail contacts listed on the page under, "People you might know"... YA THINK?

I don't remember some of the exact verbiage used, but FB did make reference about obtaining the names from my contact list in my e-mail. I seriously don't recall seeing any request for my permission to go into my e-mail for these names. If there was, it must have been disguised in some obscure way because I would have never agreed to it.

Doesn't this just amount to them hacking into your e-mail to get the names of the people you correspond with? How can they do this? If they can do that, can't they read your e-mails if they want as well? I'm no tech expert, so I'm just stating what seems to be the logical conclusion for me with my minimal knowledge.

Account settings

Privacy settings

Who can view my photos

only friends

disaster averted.

Absolute Technologies and Absolute Statistics are buzzwords that people will be hearing much, much more of in this new decade.

Absolute technologies are the golden goose for most companies, they take the gray area out of market research.

You plug in your new coffee pot, it automatically connects to the manufacturer and registers itself. Of course this validates your warranty along with a few other crumbs they'll throw in. It now reports back, right through the power jack - who uses the coffee pot (it links up with your rfid), how often they use it, when they use it, etc. These statistics are absolute - they require no research and they leave nothing to question.

This is coming people, get ready. We are all about to be completely reduced to a large database of assets and liabilities. The only things standing in the way were advancements in information technologies, and they've caught up now. There is plenty of storage for massive information, and viable methods for collecting and moving it.