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Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

bbc.com

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Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#11

Post by inetknght »

Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

> Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that.

Not reading a 1000 page EULA doesn't make users stupid. It makes Facebook predatory.

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#12

Post by ginko »

Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

>The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to third-parties and Facebook should somehow be faulted for that.

Even so you wrote yourself that users shared data about their friends. Why does Facebook allow people to share the data of others who didn't agree to this?

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#13

Post by ceejayoz »

bzb6 wrote: post #10
JKCalhoun wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I may be mistaken, but I understood that "stupid users" allowed access to their friends/contacts as well. I guess I'm stupid too if I have a stupid friend or relative.

If your friend has view access to your profile, why shouldn’t he be able to extract that information via an API as well?

For the same reason visiting my house doesn't mean they can steal the silverware?

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#14

Post by bzb6 »

inetknght wrote: post #11
Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

> Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. Not reading a 1000 page EULA doesn't make users stupid. It makes Facebook predatory.

There’s no thousand page EULA. Just a screen that says “do you want to allow this app to access your profile data and your friend list” and they clicked yes.

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#16

Post by Cthulhu_ »

Nextgrid wrote: post #4
bzb6 wrote: post #2

This is the result of open APIs. It shows why web sites like Facebook have to close them down. They are not worth it, they are a liability.

Disagreed - this is the result of stupid users. If the APIs are gone they will just be entering their Facebook credentials directly (which would leak way more data than what relatively limited API access allows).

People ARE stupid, this is a known fact; this is one reason why consumer and privacy protection laws are a thing, why two-factor authentication is a thing, why e-mail verification of logins is a thing, why you can't just start trading in stocks, buy alcohol, etc etc etc.

Companies protect their users from themselves; they HAVE to, in case they (the users) shoot themselves in the foot. And consumer have a reasonable expectation, regardless of Facebook's terms & conditions, that their data isn't shared to third parties - or that they at least get asked when it happens, instead of being pointed to a tl;dr of T's & C's.

Plenty of people do not have the literacy level to understand terms and conditions [1]. This is a worrying trend, but it's something that companies like Facebook should (and are) aware of - people don't read terms and conditions, people don't understand them.

[1] https://literacytrust.org.uk/parents-and-families/adult-lite...

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#17

Post by lupire »

manux wrote: post #9
Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

> Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to third-parties and Facebook should somehow be faulted for that. It's not clear to me that they shouldn't be faulted. How many people read terms and conditions? How many people lack the technological literacy to understand what it means to share their facebook data with third-parties? It seems to me like we should make our systems robust to the average user…

Reading the EULA and T&C are irrelevant, because what CA did wrong was violate the EULA and T&C.

Anyway, You are making an argument for regulations requiring disclosures, like in mortgages and nutrition labels, not an argument that Facebook is at fault for letting users interact with 3rd parties, which could have been a browser extension that scraped the same data that the FB API provides.

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#18

Post by Rygian »

Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

If "stupid" user A can tell Facebook to share user B's information with a third party, then I see Facebook evidently at fault.

Only user B has the right to consent to such processing.

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#19

Post by lupire »

inetknght wrote: post #11
Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

> Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. Not reading a 1000 page EULA doesn't make users stupid. It makes Facebook predatory.

There's no 1000 page EULA to read, and FB wasn't the predator. CA asked for data and user said yes, same as if you accept a friend request with someone who gossips about you behind your back.

Re: Facebook sued for ‘losing control’ of users’ data

#20

Post by lm28469 »

Nextgrid wrote: post #3

I'm no Facebook fan but the reasons behind the lawsuit are bad and could set a bad precedent. Cambridge Analytica used the Facebook API to ask users to share data about them & their friends. Stupid users agreed to that. The argument here isn't that Facebook is playing fast and loose with tracking & user data (which would be a legitimate argument), it's that Facebook is allowing people to grant access to their data to…

> Stupid users agreed to that.

This is on the level of "poor people should just stop being poor" or "she was raped because she didn't dress decently enough"

On on side you have a mega corp doing all it can to harvest as much data as possible, backed by behavioural analysis, AB testing, and all kind of studies on how to trick people's brain into feeding the algorithm with more data points. On the other hand you have "stupid users"

The role of governments, at least in Europe, is, in part and in theory, to protect "stupid" people from mega corp sharks and other predators

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