All the talk about privacy and Facebook made me examine my own personal settings. One day after class I went through the tedious process of going through and customizing my privacy settings. A lot of things that I allowed "friends of friends" was changed to "friends only." Also, I deleted people that I didn't really know personally.
I felt a lot better afterwards but while in the process I discovered something new. Facebook gave me the opportunity to download all of my information posted on the site. I didn't think twice and requested to download my information. In a couple hours I received an email from Facebook with a zip drive of all my info posted on the site, dating back to 2007 when I was a senior in high school. I took a stroll down memory lane when looked at my old statuses and wall posts. I was glad I was able to see what I posted because over the years you tend to forget a lot along the lines of Facebook.
What startled me was that Facebook has access to all this information that they are quite possibly showing to other people. This wasn't news to me, but actually downloading the file to my computer put in perspective how accessible my information really is.
Another thing, I know people that get their accounts hacked often or have other people that know their login information. A major setback of this download feature is that someone can hack into your account, type in your password and download YOUR information. That's scary to me, but since Facebook isn't as private as we may have thought it was, we should keep a better eye on our accounts.
Here's a video that shows you how to access this feature.
It is definitely a concern that there is so much personal information out there, but that is the price we chose to pay when we signed up. It is crazy that they can share your information with who ever they want though. It is annoying that you have to click for days just to hide stuff. When it comes to hacking into your account, it is the same thing that people worry about with their email, it is too easy to hack into people's accounts. It comes down to you to be smarter and make your password and private information, private.
ReplyDeleteIf Facebook is able to access all of this information, then why can't it delete it all and allow users to delete thier facebook completely?
ReplyDeleteI had no idea Facebook had this downloard feature and I am also concerned that this information is made so available. I'm curious to know how long info stays in the system. Does facebook really have everything that I have done since I opened my account or only the stuff in the past few years?
ReplyDeleteI think you made a really good point, Caitlyn. One of the weirdest things about how facebook functions is the whole idea that you can never delete your account completely. When my friend recently tried to delete hers, I was completely blown away that it would always exist and she just had to log in to have it reappear.
ReplyDeleteDo you think a REAL delete option would affect your outlook on the privacy issue? I guess there's always the panic that your information is floating around somewhere in cyberspace, but maybe a delete option would cushion the craziness.
As someone pointed out in class of how in order to delete our facebook account permanentlly, we need to delete all of our posts and information that we hav shared ever since we started facebook. However even if we take the time to delete all the posts and pictures, if facebook can keep track of all our posts, I feel those posts will remain somewhere in the system.
ReplyDelete