Opinion: Does anyone still care about internet privacy?

 

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Posted on 13 Jan 2010 at 10:33

"People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people. That social norm is just something that has evolved over time... we decided that these would be the social norms now and we just went for it."

Mark Zuckerberg's statement in a TechCrunch interview, coming shortly after a mass privacy policy change for Facebook's 350 million users, has caused a small storm among online commentators.

We carried out a quick straw poll of the Expert Reviews staff to gauge our own opinions on internet privacy. In general, we feel that it's inadvisable to put anything anywhere on the internet if you're not prepared for the possibility that it could be seen by anyone. That said, if a social network claims to offer some control over who sees what, then they should abide by this. This is particularly significant if you have one account that you use for business, social and family relationships.

When one of our team found that the permissions on his Facebook photos had been changed to allow anyone to see them, he justifiably felt that his privacy had been violated.

The real question here isn't "is privacy dead?" Instead we should perhaps be wondering exactly when it became okay for one organisation to determine exactly how private any particular part of our content (such as our photo collection) should be.

Sharing personal information, often in surprisingly intimate detail, with the world in general is undeniably part of the modern zeitgeist. Collecting record-breaking numbers of "friends" on Facebook or Myspace without any recognisable product or creation to promote is a hobby for more than a few people. Sharing your personal life with this online audience belongs to same cultural mentality that fuels reality TV and celebrity gossip magazines.

There's nothing exactly wrong with this social phenomenon, but before we all accept a general lack of privacy as normal, we should all give some thought to who is defining that norm. The most telling part of Zuckerberg's statement is "we decided that these would be the social norms now". Facebook may have decided, but most of us would at least have liked to have been asked.

There's more at stake here than your family accidentally seeing photos of that wild night out. Employees have been sacked from several organisations due to their online activities. Sharing photos of your home, general data about your local area and information about whether you're in or not is more than enough temptation for a burgler according to financial services group Legal & General. Meanwhile, the government will soon be asking communications service providers (including Facebook) to keep records of your every activity (although the contents of a private message will not be recorded – only the fact that it was sent).

It may be increasingly normal to give up your privacy, but there are plenty of reasons to suggest that it's not always a very good idea.

Author: Kat Orphanides