Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#101

Post by snarf21 » Thu, May 04, 2023, 1:58 PM UTC

wirthjason wrote: post #16

Since there is bound to be a lot of Facebook bashing I’ll point out that they occasionally do some good. In the case of software they can be good stewards of FOSS. I listened to this CoRecursive episode about the history of Zstandard compression algorithm and how FB allowed the author, Yann Collet, to fully open source it while other companies wanted to keep it proprietary. https://corecursive.com/data-compression-ya…

All things in life is grey. But I think we should ask about is the MAIN thing they do net good or net bad. Most philanthropist spend their lives amassing massive fortunes built on exploitation and then leave a (large?) percentage of their ill gotten gains for good. As an extreme example, we shouldn't absolve a serial killer just because they volunteer for Meals on Wheels each week.

Facebook has revenue greater than the GDP of all but 67 countries. Allowing 10 engineers to give away some crap for free doesn't quite balance the scales imo.

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#102

Post by georgestephanis » Thu, May 04, 2023, 1:58 PM UTC

coding123 wrote: post #96

jjulius wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How can a corporation be furious? After reading the article, they don't say anything about the company or people inside the company being furious. The closest thing I could find is that a Meta spokesperson said they plan to fight it vigorously and expect to win. To be fair, the spokesperson's tone, and the insistence that they'll be fighting, does make them sound pretty pissed off.

So how about, Facebook spokesperson furious...

that's kinda the point of a spokesperson, to speak on behalf of an organization

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#103

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 04, 2023, 1:58 PM UTC

criddell wrote: post #15

How can a corporation be furious? After reading the article, they don't say anything about the company or people inside the company being furious. The closest thing I could find is that a Meta spokesperson said they plan to fight it vigorously and expect to win. Maybe the headline should be "Meta opposed to proposed FTC ban on monetizing youth data".

[deleted]

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#104

Post by zeroonetwothree » Thu, May 04, 2023, 1:58 PM UTC

tmpz22 wrote: post #80

wirthjason wrote: post #16

Since there is bound to be a lot of Facebook bashing I’ll point out that they occasionally do some good. In the case of software they can be good stewards of FOSS. I listened to this CoRecursive episode about the history of Zstandard compression algorithm and how FB allowed the author, Yann Collet, to fully open source it while other companies wanted to keep it proprietary. https://corecursive.com/data-compression-ya…

Phew thank gif they open sourced a compression library it was worth the privacy of 500_000_000 children being monetized. And where would we be without React? Chaos, chaos everywhere…

[flagged]

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#105

Post by titusjohnson » Thu, May 04, 2023, 1:59 PM UTC

coding123 wrote: post #96

jjulius wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How can a corporation be furious? After reading the article, they don't say anything about the company or people inside the company being furious. The closest thing I could find is that a Meta spokesperson said they plan to fight it vigorously and expect to win. To be fair, the spokesperson's tone, and the insistence that they'll be fighting, does make them sound pretty pissed off.

So how about, Facebook spokesperson furious...

Facebook itself is has no vocal cords or thought membrane. It's often easy to forget because we like to personify companies, but a company is just a piece of paper for tax and legal purposes.

You can safely think "Facebook wants me to think it thinks this" when a Spokesperson speaks.

You can safely think "Part of Facebook thinks this" when an individual employee speaks.

You can safely think "Facebook Corporate wants me to believe this" when an executive speaks.

All of these individuals speak for Facebook, because they are a part of the collective that is Facebook.

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#106

Post by zeroonetwothree » Thu, May 04, 2023, 2:00 PM UTC

nimajneb wrote: post #89

I really wish I could get rid of my FB account. It's so pervasive in my social life that it would things difficult and I would miss out on events with my friends. My family uses it for video chat, my friends use it to organize social activities, I'm on a recreational kickball team that uses it for team communication, etc. I recently deactivated and a few weeks later a friend asked if I was going to an event he invite…

Weird, in my circle no one uses it anymore. Although to be fair I’m not convinced that most of the alternatives are likely to be much better. I don’t see why Google wouldn’t be doing exactly the same stuff.

At least there is Signal. I’ve moved most of my messaging there.

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#107

Post by justapassenger » Thu, May 04, 2023, 2:03 PM UTC

tmpz22 wrote: post #80

wirthjason wrote: post #16

Since there is bound to be a lot of Facebook bashing I’ll point out that they occasionally do some good. In the case of software they can be good stewards of FOSS. I listened to this CoRecursive episode about the history of Zstandard compression algorithm and how FB allowed the author, Yann Collet, to fully open source it while other companies wanted to keep it proprietary. https://corecursive.com/data-compression-ya…

Phew thank gif they open sourced a compression library it was worth the privacy of 500_000_000 children being monetized. And where would we be without React? Chaos, chaos everywhere…

Source for 500M kids? Is messenger for kids that popular?

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#108

Post by zeroonetwothree » Thu, May 04, 2023, 2:04 PM UTC

AraceliHarker wrote: post #24

Mark Zuckerberg himself seems to understand the importance of privacy very well, taping over the microphone and camera on his MacBook Pro, keeping his trash can from being scavenged by others, and FB spending heavily to protect his security, so why does he have the exact opposite attitude towards others?

He isn’t forcing you to use Facebook. If you go into a store and they have a security camera that records you is that also violating your privacy?

Not saying everything FB does is ok but I think we are going too crazy with the government intervention. I don’t exactly see that FB was committing deliberate fraud based on this latest report (but a lot is redacted). It seems more like there were just some bugs? As a dev I worry about a world in which we expect perfection from all software.

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#109

Post by codepoet80 » Thu, May 04, 2023, 2:05 PM UTC

nimajneb wrote: post #89

I really wish I could get rid of my FB account. It's so pervasive in my social life that it would things difficult and I would miss out on events with my friends. My family uses it for video chat, my friends use it to organize social activities, I'm on a recreational kickball team that uses it for team communication, etc. I recently deactivated and a few weeks later a friend asked if I was going to an event he invite…

Just rip off the band-aid. Your friends can't invite you to things on Facebook if your account is fully deleted, and they'll be forced to reach out in different ways. The first 6-12 months are hard, but if you can make it past that, you won't miss it. I setup a Discord server for my family, and we're enjoying a "semi-private" social network that way -- it works well, even for grandparents. I wrote a bot that let's them save photos posted in Discord to their digital picture frame in their living room, and they love it.

Re: Facebook has not been doing enough to comply with a 2020 privacy order: FTC

#110

Post by justapassenger » Thu, May 04, 2023, 2:06 PM UTC

darthrupert wrote: post #54

Why just Facebook? Also, this is 10 years too late. Kids are using Discord, Tiktok and probably some services I've never heard of. This should include them all or it's silly or even outright harmful.

According to hacker news Facebook is dead, everyone deleted their account and only racist grandparents use it. And at the same time all the kids in the world are using it.