Online privacy is dead and it is a good thing

Posted by Bhavishya Kanjhan on Jun 14, 2010 in Default | 1 comment

Privacy and protection of online users  (and the content posted by them) has been the subject of great debate recently. The latest iteration of the Facebook Platform – a framework to create applications – has given developers and websites access to user data which they use to personalize content  for arriving users. The social network has received a tremendous amount of flak for this endeavor ranging from mild criticisms to elaborate campaigns to quit Facebook (Quit Facebook Day campaign on May 31^st). Facebook for its part has had a fairly solid privacy framework underpinning the network granting users granular control over what content can be seen by which of their friends. After the backlash, Facebook (recently) introduced considerably simpler controls to the previously complicated system. Is that enough though?