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Facebook's growth as an internet social networking site has met criticism, on a range of issues including the Privacy of users and un-moderated content effecting advertising.

Lawsuit from ConnectU.com

Template:Ongoing lawsuit Founder of Facebook.com, Mark Zuckerberg, has been accused of illegally using both the concept and source code from competing site Connectu.com. In November 2003, ConnectU engaged Mark Zuckerberg, then a sophomore at Harvard, to complete the computer programming for their website. Upon joining the ConnectU team, Zuckerberg was given full access to the website source code. Allegedly, Zuckerberg intentionally hampered the development of ConnectU while using code originally intended for ConnectU in the development of Facebook.

Since its original filing in Massachusetts the lawsuit was dismissed without prejudice due to technicality on March 28, 2007, but was never ruled on. It was refiled soon thereafter in U.S. District Court in Boston, and a preliminary hearing was scheduled for July 25 2007. Facebook asked the district court to dismiss the case. The attorneys representing Facebook referred to the allegations as "broad brush", "false" and that they are unsubstantiated with evidence.

Privacy concerns

There have been some concerns expressed regarding the use of Facebook as a means of surveillance and data mining. Theories have been written about the possible misuse of Facebook and privacy proponents have criticised the site's current privacy agreement. According to the policy, "We may use information about you that we collect from other sources, including but not limited to newspapers and Internet sources such as blogs, instant messaging services and other users of Facebook, to supplement your profile." However, some features—such as AIM away-message harvesting and campus newspaper monitoring—have been dropped and Facebook has since responded to the concerns. Facebook has assured worried users the next privacy policy will not include the clause about information collection and has denied any data mining is being done "for the CIA or any other group." However, the possibility of data mining by private individuals unaffiliated with Facebook remains open, as evidenced by the fact that two MIT students were able to download, using an automated script, over 70,000 Facebook profiles from four schools (MIT, NYU, the University of Oklahoma, and Harvard) as part of a research project on Facebook privacy published on December 14th, 2005.

Another clause that some users are critical of reserves the right to sell users' data to private companies, stating "We may share your information with third parties, including responsible companies with which we have a relationship." This concern has also been addressed by spokesman Chris Hughes who said "Simply put, we have never provided our users' information to third party companies, nor do we intend to." It is unclear if Facebook plans to remove that clause as well.

Third party applications have access to almost all user information and "Facebook does not screen or approve Platform Developers and cannot control how such Platform Developers use any personal information."

In August 2007 the code used to dynamically generate Facebook's home and search page as visitors browse the site was accidentally made public, according to leading internet news sites . A configuration problem on a Facebook server caused the PHP code to be displayed instead of the web page the code should have created, raising concerns about how secure private data on the site was. A visitor to the site copied, published and later removed the code from his web forum, claiming he had been served legal notice by Facebook. Facebook's response was quoted by the site that broke the story

A small fraction of the code that displays Facebook web pages was exposed to a small number of users due to a single misconfigured web server that was fixed immediately. It was not a security breach and did not compromise user data in any way. Because the code that was released only powers the Facebook user interface, it offers no useful insight into the inner workings of Facebook. The reprinting of this code violates several laws and we ask that people not distribute it further.

Another problem is that when signing up, Facebook asks if you want to spread the word about Facebook, prompting you to enter your email's password-- on Facebook's own site.

Removal of advertising

On 3 August, 2007, British companies including First Direct, Vodafone, Virgin Media, the The Automobile Association, Halifax and the Prudential removed their adverts from Facebook. A Virgin Media spokeswoman said "We want to advertise on social networks but we have to protect our brand". The companies found that their services were being advertised on pages of the British National Party, a far-right political party in the UK. New Media Age magazine was first to alert the companies that their ads were coming up on BNP's Facebook page. The AA also pulled its advertising from YouTube when a BBC documentary showed that videos of school children fighting were available on that site.

Breastfeeding photos suppressed, accounts cancelled, alleged Terms of Use violations

On 7 September, 2007, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that Facebook had begun removing photos uploaded by mothers of themselves breastfeeding their babies, and also cancelling their Facebook accounts. While claiming that these photos violate their decency code by showing an exposed breast, even when the baby covered the nipple, Facebook took several days to respond to calls to deactivate a paid advertisement for a dating service that used a photo of a topless model.

Termination of accounts after adding 'too many' friends

In addition, Facebook is so concerned about the misuse of the site for data mining that adding too many friends too quickly can result in a permanently disabled account even if done by a real person. They respond only with form letters and the receptionists refuse to pass along phone calls regarding this. They insist that Facebook is for staying in touch with friends you already have, not making new friends, even those who are friends with people you know in real life.

Account terminations

Facebook has also faced criticism for not allowing users to permanently terminate their accounts. The website only gives users the option of "deactivating." However, once an account has been deactivated, all the personal information of users remain on Facebook's servers in case in the future they wish to reactivate. The website provides no means for users to permanently delete their account. A student from the University of British Columbia pursued the issue with Facebook. A Facebook representative responded by asking the student to "clear his account" before the termination process could begin. This included "415 wall posts, 126 friends, and 38 groups." The student subsequently gave up on terminating his account permanently as the process of deleting every wall post, friend and group on his profile would require 1158 mouse clicks.

News Feed and Mini-Feed

On September 5, 2006, Facebook introduced two new features called "News Feed" and "Mini-Feed". The first of the new features, News Feed, appears on every Facebook member's home page, displaying recent Facebook activities of a member's friends. The second feature, Mini-Feed, keeps a log of similar events on each member's profile page. Members can manually delete items from their Mini-Feeds if they wish to do so, and through privacy settings are able to control what is actually published in their respective Mini-Feeds.

Some Facebook members still feel that the ability to opt-out of the entire News Feed and Mini-Feed system is necessary, as evidenced by a statement from the Students Against Facebook News Feed group, which peaked at over 740,000 members. However, according to recent news articles, members have widely regarded the additional privacy options as an acceptable compromise.

Another problem is that the Facebook users may be under the impression that deleting something from one's Mini-Feed deletes it from the News Feed as well. It does not. In fact, there is no way to prevent some forms of updates to one's profile from being broadcast over the News Feed, as Facebook offers only a limited opt-out list. Users unaware of the News Feed function often unintentionally broadcast profile changes. Some information may even be sent over News-Feed without the knowledge of the user. For example, imported notes are put into the News Feed, even though notes can be set up to import automatically. This can automatically associate a user in the News Feed with whoever writes on the blog that they are importing.

Concerns of higher education faculty and administrators

On January 23, 2006, The Chronicle of Higher Education continued an ongoing national debate on social networks with an opinion piece written by Michael Bugeja, director of the Journalism School at Iowa State University, entitled "Facing the Facebook". Bugeja, author of the Oxford University Press text Interpersonal Divide (2005), quoted representatives of the American Association of University Professors and colleagues in higher education to document the distraction of students using Facebook and other social networks during class and at other venues in the wireless campus. Bugeja followed up on January 26, 2007 in The Chronicle with an article titled "Distractions in the Wireless Classroom," quoting several educators across the country who were banning laptops in the classroom. Similarly, organisations such as the National Association for Campus Activities, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, and others have hosted seminars and presentations to discuss ramifications of students' use of Facebook and other social networking systems. The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative has also released a brief pamphlet entitled "7 Things You Should Know About Facebook" aimed at higher education professionals that "describes what is, where it is going, and why it matters to teaching and learning".

Integration of high school users

Following the February 27, 2006 integration of the high school and college levels, some college users began creating groups critical of the decision. Users from opposite branches could only fully interact if they were friends and some separation did remain. The site also released the Limited Profile privacy settings and advised students on how to hide pictures and other features from others. However, some college users felt that the site's former exclusivity had been key to their experience. Some expressed concerns about the ability of unknown persons to create accounts on the high school version (since university addresses are not required) and use them to access the college version; by default, strangers can message and view users' friends through a simple global search. Some made predictions that the site would soon face issues with spammers, stalkers, or worse, and worried this would result in controversies similar to the bad publicity seen by MySpace.

Adding to the controversy around opening Facebook to younger students, four high school students at Birchmount Park Collegiate Institute in Toronto, Ontario were arrested in a Facebook-related protest on March 23, 2007. Earlier that week, five different students had been suspended for posting criticisms about a vice-principal of their school. About a dozen friends of the suspendees had decided to protest in front of the school, but that handful soon grew to over 100 students protesting for free speech. Local law enforcement authorities were called, and a scuffle ensued, resulting in the arrest of 4 students.

Weblinks

• Social networks in the internet and anonymity

References

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14. Personal e-mail from customer service representative Theodore to User:Scottandrewhutchins, August 31, 2007.
15. e-mail to user, October 18 2007, http://coolug.livejournal.com/68749.html
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21. Bugeja, Michael J (2007-01-26). "Distractions in the Wireless Classroom". Chronicle Careers. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved 2007-06-26.
22. National Association of Campus Activities (2006-07-12). "Facing the Facebook". Retrieved 2006-10-06. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
23. Association for Education in Journalism and Communication (2006). "Facing the Facebook: Administrative Issues Involving Social Networks". Retrieved 2006-10-06.
24. EDUCAUSE Learning Institute (2006). "7 Things You Should Know About Facebook". Retrieved 2006-10-06.
25. Bunting, Jillian M (2006-03-02). "New Facebook Feature Could Out Students". The Harvard Crimson. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
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27. Schneider, Adam P (2006-02-08). "How Much About You Is Out There?". The Harvard Crimson. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
28. "Toronto high school students scuffle with police". The Globe and Mail (registration required for full text). 2007-03-23. Retrieved 2007-06-19.