Privacy online? Saving face on Facebook.
- November 27, 2007 1:57 PM |
- By Your Voice
"There are over two million Canadian users on Facebook. In fact, Canadians are the largest-growing user group on the social networking site.
Whether we go to the site for work or play, for building friendships or business contacts, Facebook and sites like it enable us to connect with each other.
But, as with everything that shifts from the private to the public domain, our Facebook lives can also leave us exposed.
Will your potential employer stumble across those photos of you enjoying a night on the town? Should you blog about your boss?
Where should the line between personal and professional be drawn in the too-much-information age?
Nora Young is fascinated with the relationship between technology and culture, a topic she pursues on CBC Radio, on television, in print, and online.
Nora started with CBC as the founding host and a producer of Definitely Not the Opera , where she was a frequent commenter on technology and popular culture. She is currently the host of CBC Radio's technology show, Spark.
On Friday, November 30 Nora took your questions on professionalism and privacy online.
Thanks for all of your questions and check out Nora's answers below.
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Comments (11)
What do you make of the various EULAs [end-user license agreements] that govern software and online e-mail? Are they too intrusive? Who "owns" your g-mail? What about software "phoning home"?
Nora Young: Hi Theodore,
You ask an excellent question; unfortunately, it falls outside my area of expertise. Sorry!
Would our willingness to expose ourselves to such an environment not suggest that we are more exhibitionist than previously believed?
Nora Young: Interesting question. I think it depends on how you use ‘environments’ like social networks. For many people, it seems to be more about making connections and expressing themselves, though I agree that at times it becomes exhibitionist or narcissistic. What interests me is how using social networks is changing our notions of what’s private and what’s public.
How popular are webcams for conducting face-to-face meetings in the corporate world? Should they be used when working with students, especially if they are teleworking from home.
Thank you for your consideration of this question.
Marian Doucette
County of Huron, IT Division
Nora Young: I was just exchanging emails on this very topic with a “road warrior” friend of mine as he sat in yet another airport going to yet another meeting in a different country. I think that in the corporate sector, there’s recognition that all that air travel is tiring for employees. There have been a number of recent moves to make “telepresence” work better, such as having really large, high definition screens so that you can really see facial expressions and body language, getting a sense of the person that you really can’t get with conventional little web cams. The problem is they’re expensive, so not a practical solution for many businesses or with students. Another interesting (and cheaper) possibility is ‘virtual meetings’ in online environments such as Second Life. I know IBM has experimented with this.
As far as education goes, as distance learning grows, there have been more experiments with less expensive video conferencing systems.
I think for most applications, it really depends on context. Nothing beats face-to-face if you’re having an important meeting where subtleties of communication are important.
Marketers seem to be increasingly interested in personalized advertising because they are now able to mine data with sophisticated programs and make sense out of it. As a result, our privacy is being undermined. I mean, even in a public library, it's considered rude to look at someone else's computer screen. It's creepy that with Facebook's new "Beacon" system, corporations will know all your buying patterns. Is there no common courtesy? I acknowledge that information posted on the site is available to all, but this is going too far.
What can a consumer do to limit such spying activities?
Nora Young: I think there are a couple of issues here. As you may know by now, (it’s Friday morning as I write this) Facebook has just backed down on some of the more intrusive aspects of Beacon. I don’t think we can necessarily expect ‘common courtesy’ from data mining corporations, but we can expect them to be responsive to consumer ire. This is where our power lies, particularly in social networking websites, where we are the ones bringing the data. What makes a business such as Facebook valuable is its access to a large pool of accurate, up-to-date data about users. Their business plan has to include not ticking off users by being overly intrusive. The problem is, the line over what is ‘too intrusive’ is relative and constantly shifting.
Are social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace, really being used as business contact tools?
Nora Young: I think it depends both on what social networking site you use, and what business you are in. Something like LinkedIn is specifically designed to be a tool for professional contacts; you’re not going to find ‘superpokes’ and ‘zombies’ there. The issue there is whether many people in your line of work or related fields use the service.
Personally, as a journalist, I’ve found Facebook to be a valuable tool, for instance, for finding interview guests, and have been approached by other people about professional matters on Facebook. It’s such a popular service that people use it almost like a directory. I’ve also seen the ‘group’ function used as a way for people in a similar line of work to network informally. That said, other than LinkedIn, the purpose of most social networks is more of an informal, social one. I think it would be kind of creepy if someone I didn’t know sent me a Facebook message because they were looking for a job. It would be better to go through my place of business for that. To me, the professional value in social networking sites is simply to create a presence online. That way, you can present a less formal, fuller picture of yourself and your interests, and also use that online presence so that you are ‘findable.’
Hi Nora
I am an 'older' Sparks listener who has been 'wired' to the Internet/World Wide Web for the past 12 years and recently recieved an invitation from my daughter in Europe (Luxembourg) to join Facebook.
I did ... and shortly thereafter came to the conclusion that it is but another device used for marketing ... It seems everything is reduced to 'Hits & Clicks' in todays digital world and any redeeming social value is quickly lost.
I'm wondering if you and most of the sparks listeners do not see things in the same way?
Nora Young: Hi Barrie,
I think social networks in particular are highly subjective, in terms of people’s comfort level with them. As a general rule, the generation ‘growing up digital’ now has a looser sense of what’s ‘private’ than those of us who grew up pre-digital. To me, the meaningful boundary lies in how intrusive the advertising is, and how much control I retain over what happens with my data. I don’t have a problem with a useful service targeting ads at me, as long as the advertising parties are not being directly given my personal information. So, for instance, if a social networking site sells ads to a popcorn company by putting popcorn ads on each person’s profile that lists ‘popcorn’ as an interest, I would consider that sort of ‘blind’ targeted marketing fair exchange for the service they’re providing. It would be an entirely different matter if they were to turn over the names and email addresses of everyone interested in popcorn to that third party.
Certainly, we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that social networking sites are businesses that make money by advertising, but so is television programming and Google searching, and I still find those useful.
I think it can have social value. People join groups around social causes for instance, such as those that sprang up after the crackdown on protests in Burma. That can be a useful tool for social organization. On the other hand, there’s a lot of time-wasting nonsense, narcissism, and bullying that goes on as well.
If you delete photos or information from Facebook after posting it, is it *really* deleted? (and not still stored on some marketing database somewhere)?
Nora Young: Hi Tamara,
That’s an excellent question, and one I don’t know the answer to for sure. I’m not an expert on Facebook’s terms of service. That said, here’s my best sense. According to Facebook’s own privacy info:
“You understand and acknowledge that, even after removal, copies of User Content may remain viewable in cached and archived pages or if other Users have copied or stored your User Content”
So no, they will not guarantee that the information is gone completely. That said, it seems to me that the business case for Facebook is based on its ability to provide accurate, up-to-date information about its users, and it doesn’t need to reveal your specific identity to do that.
Again, from Facebook’s terms of service:
“Facebook may use information in your profile without identifying you as an individual to third parties. We do this for purposes such as aggregating how many people in a network like a band or movie and personalizing advertisements and promotions.”
As well, some countries in which Facebook operates have legislation that prohibits keeping data longer than necessary, so I don’t know that it would be legal for Facebook to deliberately store that info. A key point to remember is that you cannot simply ‘delete’ your Facebook account. If you ‘deactivate’ it, your data remains. You need to go in and individually delete all those photos, messages, wall posts, etc. Remember that information and photos that you post can be copied by other people; Facebook has no responsibility for that. If a friend-of-a-friend copies that embarrassing picture of you, you deleting it from your profile isn’t going to help.
My concern is more for the younger crowd using mediums like Facebook for fun, not really understanding the consequences of advertising themselves to the world. I would ask if parents are taking any kind of a role in determining what the kids are allowed to post on these sites?
Nora Young: One of the best “penny drop” moments I had in the early days of Facebook’s rise in popularity here in Canada was with a professor from Simon Fraser University. His point was that social networks like Facebook are not for privacy, they’re for publicizing some aspect of yourself. I think this principle needs to be communicated to young people.
There’s evidence that most young people are aware enough not to make all their information publicly available to everyone (ie, to keep personal info available only to recognized ‘friends’), but I’m not sure they have a clear sense of the potential damaging effect of what they are posting.
Certainly, I think part of responsible parenting has to be familiarizing oneself with the networks your child uses.
I suspect users would behave very differently if, below '323 friends' in their sidebar, one also saw '49 million strangers'. The architecture of the site is carefully designed to feel intimate and trusted, when of course it is completely open. As the new Beacon feature makes quite clear. My question: the company has been quite vocal on the number of joiners to date, but have they released any date on the number of people shutting down their profiles and leaving the site?
Nora Young: Great point. Since you sent this question, Chris, Facebook has had to step back from some — though not all — aspects of Beacon plan because of a backlash from users, and this is really the ultimate protection that we have with any of these Web 2.0 applications which are only platforms for the content that users supply; we are the ones who bring value. If Facebook ticks off its user base, they may easily be poached by other social networks. As far as I know, Facebook has not released any information about people leaving the site. As I suggested to Tamara, though, it’s not exactly a simple proposition to ‘leave’ Facebook.
Is it reasonable to have an expectation of privacy in the digital age, or is it safer to assume no privacy and act accordingly?
If there was no anonymity do you think that individuals would interact in a more civil manner on the internet?
Nora Young: Sad to say, Jeff, that I think the prudent thing is not to assume that you have privacy. Now that there are so many easy platforms for publishing text, audio, and images, even if you choose not to participate online, people can still be publishing information about you. You might be interested in checking out the Privacy Commissioner’s website for some information.
http://www.privcom.gc.ca/index_e.asp
As to anonymity, personally, I think the cherished idea of online anonymity is a big cause of the rudeness of the online world. I have a real problem with the lack of accountability online.
I'm addicted to social networking sites, I even have a Friendster account ... still!
How can I maintain these sites (I can't bring myself to delete) and still have a sense of professionalism online - let's say a could-be boss googles me?
Any suggestions?
Nora Young: Friendster! Sasha, you’re old school!
I think the appropriate analogy is with the office Christmas party. You can be looser and more fun-loving, but stop short of wearing a lampshade on your head. A social networking site is an opportunity for you to reveal your personal side and put your best foot forward. I think that’s understood even by would-be employers, but I just wouldn’t post anything I wouldn’t want made public or seen by a boss.
Your judgment should be based partly on what industry you work in. The expectations of what’s acceptable behaviour differ wildly by job type, as they do by age.
The other thing is to make rigorous use of the ‘granular’ privacy features of a site such as Facebook. This is a real advantage of some social networks. You can, for instance, remove tags of your name on photos that other people have added, so they don’t appear in your profile.