As various public health, youth and consumer groups work this week to request the Federal Trade Commission block Facebook from passing a bunch of sketchy changes to its privacy policy, we’re reminded of the old German legend of Faust.
Faust, commonly known as Dr. Faustus, was a scholar who famously made a pact with the devil. In exchange for the doctor’s soul, the devil would provide Faustus with whatever information he might request. However, the fun didn’t last long: The devil eventually returned to collect Faustus’ soul, and Faust met a gruesome death.
These days, we don’t necessarily need to exchange our souls for endless information. Rather than signing a contract in blood, as Faustus did, we simply click “I Agree” to Facebook’s terms and conditions. And in this situation, Mark Zuckerberg is the devil.
In a review of the 2013 documentary “Terms and Conditions May Apply,” The Huffington Post contributor Mark Weinstein wrote, “By clicking the ‘I Agree’ button, you blindly assent to hand over your life and interests to billion-dollar corporations to do with it what they may.”
The problem with free Internet services like Facebook and Google is that they aren’t exactly free. For users, the currency of free Internet services isn’t money — it’s your personal data.
The FTC has already taken action against Facebook, a notorious distributor of personal data both to private corporations and the government. In 2011, Facebook had to settle with the FTC after it changed users’ default settings to make their information public, thus violating their privacy.
However, the 2011 conflict with the FTC hasn’t discouraged Facebook from bending to the will of its financial backers. The company is currently attempting to change the language in its privacy policy to accommodate advertisers at the expense of its users.
A Los Angeles Times article printed last week stated, “Facebook wants to put in place new language that requires users to give the company permission to use their name, image and personal information in advertising. ”
Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg told attendees at a tech conference last week that his No. 1 job was to protect user data, according to the L.A. Times. He also blamed the government for failing to strike the right balance between protecting citizens from terrorist attacks and violating their civil liberties.
This is, of course, ludicrous — Zuckerberg knowingly supplies the government and private corporations with private user data. Pointing his finger at the government rather than taking accountability is a cowardly move.
Simply boycotting Facebook, unfortunately, is out of the question. The bottomless source of information — about our friends and family, our schools and places of employment, the products and services we buy — is, admittedly, a nice convenience. Although our Faustian deal with Facebook won’t end with eternal damnation, it has already cost us our right to privacy.
A version of this editorial ran on page 6 on 9/19/2013 under the headline "Privacy is dead: Facebook violates our civil liberties"
