FACEBOOK’S private policies turn public

“Facebook,” one of the world’s largest social networks, has a chief privacy officer that has been predicted to diminish in the next few years because of its enormous growth and the building of relationships with other competing and social networks leading to a smaller gap between the private and the public. The main issue is that many of Facebook’s members consisting of mostly high school students, college students, and graduates, all seem to have no problem with sharing their personal information, but also have the concern of having their privacy withdrawn. Among members, a Law of Amiable Inclusiveness seems to be revealing itself: over time, many are deciding that the easiest path is to routinely accept “friend requests,” completing a sequence begun when one member seeks to designate another as a Facebook friend. In other words, they are defining “friend” simply as any Facebook member who communicates a wish to be one. Facebook provides many different types of privacy policies and options, where many of these members do not take advantage of. They ignore the opportunity to change their privacy settings and then blame the network for revealing such private data. But many of these private settings can be easily “tweaked” by users who need or want to find out more about an individual. Facebook does let members create customized subsets of friends. Members can selectively restrict access to some items, such as photo albums and videos. But because of the amount of time and/or amount of clicks a user must go through to create a custom permission account, many of these users are shying away from the advantages that Facebook offers. For many members, “friends” now means a mish-mash of real friends, former friends, friends of friends, and non-friends; younger and older relatives; colleagues and, if cursed, a nosy boss or two. Everyone accepted as a “friend” gets the same access. When the distinction blurs between one’s few close friends and the many that are not, it seems pointless to distinguish between private and public.