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Comment by Xuzz | Hacker News Reader

Either it's a non-story, and so it doesn't matter. Or it is a story, and they are being proactive and going out of their way to solve the issue before it gets bigger. Either way, it can't hurt: nobody is saying that they are hurting their users here.

However, due to the number of comments and stories in recent months I've seen, it is certainly appearing to be a real problem (regardless of reality). So, I don't think it's that bad for Facebook to respond to what a least some people — including, it seems, at least a few on HN — think is a realissue?

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They can't win with some people. Either they ignore it and those people say they don't care about privacy, or they rattle the sabre (for their users' benefit, for once) and people say they're posturing or spinning a nothing into something positive for them. I guess it's the PR department's job to do this but I get the impression that for some they're the new big company that you can love to hate.

Personally I think it's better that they said it, whether the reality of these increasingly common stories is actually so common or not.

It's not a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" scenario at all.

There is no downside to Facebook saying no asking for passwords for interviews. It makes them look good and justifies their walled garden approach.

If Facebook truly cared about privacy, they would actually listen to the requests such as the ability to delete ALL your data as well as the ability to toggle privacy settings for all fields instead of the ones Facebook deems acceptable.

I should've explained what I saw as the "amateur" PR move: Collecting the data and saying it wasn't a real problem. (Or perhaps ignoring it, but arguably they've been doing that.)

That solution takes time, resources and doesn't necessarily alleviate fears.

Instead, they added to the story in a way that did alleviate fears, all while not wasting any resources.

But I agree with your assessment: It's a good move whether or not my take on it is correct.

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