16 Comments »According to a Valleywag post from yesterday, a Facebook employee reportedly modified a user’s profile picture to a graphic image after looking up her password and logging into her account. In a follow-up post, Nicholas Carlson has published a copy of his inquiry to the named Facebook employee and the response he received.
If there is any proof of this taking place, the Facebook employee should be fired. Last month I wrote about Facebook employees have unrestricted access to the Facebook database and can modify items within the database freely. Since then, Valleywag posted another article on this topic. Valleywag has alluded to the issue being a company filled with “angsty, hormone-riddled” youngsters having complete access to anybody’s profile.
While that’s a moot point given that this would still be an issue even if all the employees were “mature adults,” the issue remains that Facebook employees have complete access to anyone’s profile. Personally, I don’t want to mention the name of the employee given that I am now completely dependent on Facebook and I might risk having my profile shut down after being accused of a terms of service violation (as the Valleywag reporter did). One thing is for sure: Facebook is going to need to develop more stringent internal policies if they are going to expand into the multi-billion dollar company that many are expecting them too.
This is a rumor and has not been substantiated - don’t you think your title is a little too certain? The story reported in the linked article isn’t even believable (imo).
Whether or not they are modifying the profiles, it has long been known that Facebook employees have access to their database. This is the real problem here.
Nick,
Chill buddy. This is thin ice you are walking on my friend. Don’t follow Valleywag down the toliet.
I am sure they have a security policy and officer.
Would modifying the title to say “Rumor” make this legitimate? Facebook has said that any malicious actions by employees will be reprimanded and appropriate actions will be taken. All I did was link to their article. … I’ll switch the title to say “Rumor:” but aside from that I’m using Valleywag as the source.
The majority of people reading this blog know that Valleywag is a rumor mill.
Additionally, if they really have this policy in place why doesn’t Facebook make a statement on it? Their current privacy policy makes no suggestion that they restrict access.
For more, read this article:
http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/22/why-i-stopped...
This is a rumor and has not been substantiated - don’t you think your title is a little too certain? The story reported in the linked article isn’t even believable (imo).
Whether or not they are modifying the profiles, it has long been known that Facebook employees have access to their database. This is the real problem here.
If (a big “if”) the VW rumors and follow-up are substantiated, this is definitely newsworthy: Facebook deleting someone’s account for publicly criticizing them.
If they delete your profile for talking about the VW vs. Facebook spat, that is flat-out ridiculous.
To Rodney’s point - Facebook has a Chief Privacy Officer, but he hasn’t done anything to improve their Security and Privacy policies since Nick quoted my story a month ago. Here is the story, it breaks out their privacy and security polciies and compares them to other popular sites like MySpace, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft…you decide:
http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/22/why-i-stopped...
Nick,
Chill buddy. This is thin ice you are walking on my friend. Don’t follow Valleywag down the toliet.
I am sure they have a security policy and officer.
Would modifying the title to say “Rumor” make this legitimate? Facebook has said that any malicious actions by employees will be reprimanded and appropriate actions will be taken. All I did was link to their article. … I’ll switch the title to say “Rumor:” but aside from that I’m using Valleywag as the source.
The majority of people reading this blog know that Valleywag is a rumor mill.
Additionally, if they really have this policy in place why doesn’t Facebook make a statement on it? Their current privacy policy makes no suggestion that they restrict access.
For more, read this article:
http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/22/why-i-stopped-using-facebook/
If (a big “if”) the VW rumors and follow-up are substantiated, this is definitely newsworthy: Facebook deleting someone’s account for publicly criticizing them.
If they delete your profile for talking about the VW vs. Facebook spat, that is flat-out ridiculous.
To Rodney’s point - Facebook has a Chief Privacy Officer, but he hasn’t done anything to improve their Security and Privacy policies since Nick quoted my story a month ago. Here is the story, it breaks out their privacy and security polciies and compares them to other popular sites like MySpace, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft…you decide:
http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/22/why-i-stopped-using-facebook/
Valleywag is a rag, we all know it. I’m not entirely certain why you’re giving them such credence.
Do we have ANY evidence that this woman’s profile was changed?
Valleywag is a rag, we all know it. I’m not entirely certain why you’re giving them such credence.
Do we have ANY evidence that this woman’s profile was changed?