Last month the criticism of Facebook,the most popular social networking site,was in the headlines around the world regarding breach of privacy. Tamir Israel of the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic pointed out that Facebook and other social networking sites needs to improve their own privacy issues.Canada’s privacy commissioner is set to announce on this thursday how Facebook will comply with privacy concerns.
Israel said on Webnesday,”This sets a standard”.
He also added, “Facebook was pretty high profile, so I think it would be enough to get their attention and get them to comply”
Federal privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart has said Facebook breaches Canada’s privacy law by keeping user’s information indefinitely — even after the user closed their accounts. She also raised concerns, over the sharing of personal informations with almost one million third-party software developer who develops facebook applications like quiz, horoscope and games for Facebook.
“Its not an easy fix” – Israel said
Stoddart’s office has been meeting with Facebook to see if Facebook comply with their demand on third party software venders if not, she can drag Facebook to Federal Court. Facebook has almost 12 million Canadian Users and 250 million world wide, allowing friends and families to be in touch by posting comments, photos and email messages.
Israel also commented,”If social networking sites aren’t improving their practices to meet these standards I think we will be getting involved”. That means sites like MySpace, Networking Tools, Linked In, Classmates.com and microblogging site Twitter are all under the scanner.
Isreal said, “Facebook indefinitely keeping user’s information for targetted ads is data breach, which also can be unintentional”.
The internet has holes, longer the information is kept it is likely to be leaked. There is no full proof system. Law suits have recently been filed in United States against Facebook alleging its violation of Privacy Laws. Digital Sky Technologies, a Russian investment firm, recently put Facebook’s value at US$ 6.5 billion to US$ 10 billion.