Hacker News Reader

Comment by pesenti | Hacker News Reader

No but they should:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2019/07/ftc-i...

Facebook got a penalty, but the main gripe is probably that it shouldn’t have been necessary to give one in the first place. I think what is on everyones mind is : “how can we trust a company that has a bad track record?”

I think in the coming years FB should invest more in a public conversation on these issues. How can we meet the future in a way that our data is in factuality is our data, even though it’s stored by a third party such as yourself.

Especially in light of in the FB model, where the user seems to be the product, and advertisers the client.

My point in linking to the settlement wasn't about the fine, it was about the guarantees, oversight, and accountability that came with it. Read the FTC news release, and you'll see that these are pretty extensive.

And I agree completely on the public conversation, this is why we released this dataset and why we are doing project Aria.

Understood, and I reread the article just in case. My point is/was that it must come as a natural impulse to be privacy sensitive. Privacy hopefully becomes part of the culture / dna of Facebook, not just because the FCC and the privacy board are looking over your shoulders, so to say :)

How do we prevent becoming “walkable surveillance machines”? How can we control the scope and and the issue of consent? These are more rhetorical questions, but hopefully it is part of the dialogue internally at FB.

These are great points. And yes, we'll only get there if it becomes part of the culture, which this is trying to communicate:

https://about.facebook.com/realitylabs/responsible-innovatio...

but I don't expect you to take it at face value yet, we have a long way to go.

That is a terrible example. Not only did Facebook's stock price increase after the FTC settlement,[1] which suggests that Facebook paid too small of a penalty for violating user privacy, but Facebook shareholders also filed a lawsuit last month alleging that the $5 billion payment in the settlement was structured to shield Zuckerberg from being deposed.[2] Had there not been this alleged quid pro quo, Facebook's penalty would have been even smaller.

Nobody should believe Facebook's privacy promises when the largest penalty it has ever received for profiting from user privacy violations over many years equates to one month's revenue. The incentives are simply not strong enough for Facebook to be a good actor in this area.

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/12/20692524/facebook-five-bi...

[2] https://www.politico.com/news/2021/09/21/facebook-paid-billi...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com