Facebook lobbies California on online privacy act (but shhh -- don't tell anyone)
Facebook has privacy issues. But it’s not what you think.
The leading online social-media site that’s prone to very public privacy snafus very quietly lobbied California lawmakers on the passage of a state Senate bill concerning online privacy, according to a state senator.
The Palo Alto company spent $6,600 in its efforts to fight passage of the Social Networking Privacy Act, according to filings with the California Secretary of State’s office. The bill, introduced by state Sen. Ellen Corbett (D-San Leandro) in February, would restrict social-networking sites from displaying the addresses and phone numbers of minors.
The bill passed the Senate 25-4, but floundered in the state Assembly.
Corbett told Marketwatch: “By the time it got to the Assembly, the opposition lobbying had begun. It appears they just worked in the background, to kill the bill.” Facebook did not comment on the Marketwatch story.
The average child gains a digital footprint at the age of 6 months, the Ticket recently reported, while 7% of babies have Facebook pages set up for them by parents guardians, according to a study.
Facebook's guide to privacy is here. But we didn't tell you that, right?
-- Craig Howie
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Image credit: Facebook
Its quite shocking to see how facebook has actually lobbied to kill the state Senate bill concerning online privacy and still noone took particular notice of this. I am glad that this has been brought to light now. I think facebook has gone overboard now and users should realise this and quite facebook. I have personally shut my facebook account and am now waiting for safer playforms like Diaspora and MyCube to release
Posted by: Jeremy Dent | October 28, 2010 at 09:20 PM
this is just another way facebook will use to compromise user privacy.facebook has prevented a bill in California that would restrict social-networking sites from displaying the addresses and phone numbers of minors. I deactivated my account a while back and will be switching to mycube or diaspora as soon as they open. these sites seem to care about user privacy and i think its time for us to move on to them
Posted by: muhammad husain | October 29, 2010 at 10:54 PM
The idea to restrict the networks to display the information is a great idea. The problem starts with the ability to correctly verify the users age. If you are a minor and you DO WANT your phone number etc to be show you just enter a different birth day. The great ideas that old politicians sometimes have might not work in the new internet.
Posted by: Michael | October 31, 2010 at 07:24 AM