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Comment by jstalin | Hacker News Reader

That's the last straw. I haven't done anything with my Facebook page in a while, but now I'm just going to delete it.

Do you feel FB did something wrong here, and if so could you elaborate? I don't see this as much different from subpoenas of phone records, for example.

Well for one, they handed a bunch of personal details on the friends of the suspect, and the police department published them unredacted. Being friends with a suspect can be problematic, apparently. No one wants to be known as the FB friend of a serial killer.

they handed a bunch of personal details on the friends of the suspect

Doesn't a serious investigation normally involve an investigation of people close to the suspect?

police department published them unredacted

Not FB's fault.

Not FB's fault.

That may be, but it certainly makes a case for not using FB in the first place.

I do agree, if you want information to be kept private you should keep it private.

What exactly surprised you?

While most people on hn probably know about this, you would be surprised at what the general public would think about this story. I hope it gets spread further in the media so more people know exactly what fb(and other social networking sites) keeps tabs on and what info they give out to law enforcement.

Do you think it will matter? That Farmville thing ain't gonna play itself.

Not surprised, but once in a while having something in your face brings it all home.

I've never had a Facebook account, but it surprises me that they store deleted posts.

I'm also surprised it didn't contain private messages (I'm guessing you can do this on FB?).

Yes, Facebook has a private message feature, recently merged with live chat.

Oh. Now we have Trostsky and Stalin on HN!

Google / Microsoft / the rest of the internet does this too. Keeping track of these records is required by law

There is no law in US that requires keeping records for websites.

These websites don't operate only in the US:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_data_retenti...

"Keeping track of these records is required by law."

What law? Which records? There are websites, such as those which provide anonymous web access, which say that they don't keep any records, or keep IP addresses only, or keep records for no more than 30 days, or whatever. Are they lying to us, or are they intentionally breaking some law? Exactly how can I be forced to keep any kind of log, for any period of time?

As I understand it, keeping logs is optional. However, if you keep logs and receive a subpoena, you must turn over whatever logs you have.

Not optional depending on your country:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_data_retenti...

It's a really complicated legal issue, and the last thing you would want to do as an international company is shoot yourself in the foot by deleting "evidence".

FB is an American company, and the crime of which the article speaks happened in the US, and the article you cite says:

"The United States does not have any Internet Service Provider (ISP) data retention laws similar to the European Data Retention Directive. All attempts have failed:"

THEREFORE: Under what law was FB required to retain the data, which was eventually handed over under subpoena?

Since Facebook follows the popular "Double Irish Arrangement:"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement

The location of its legal tax headquarters is up for debate; Additionally, Facebook has corporate offices all over the world in different countries: https://www.facebook.com/careers/locations Italy, India, Canada, New Zealand, Belgium, etc.

Clearly it's not just a "US" company and only has to follow "US" laws.

Taxes are not involved in the question. When it comes to US cases, FB only has to follow US laws. Therefore, data generated by US-based users should not be retained.

I may be wrong, and if so, please correct me.

But I think i remember something about Facebook having european offices in Ireland, so for us Facebook users in the European Union it's the Irish and EU laws they have to abide.

But I havent got a clue about what law regulates theese things.

Your thinking is along the right direction; see my reply to your parent comment

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