Comments on: False “Google Indexing All Your Facebook Information” Rumor

By: Susan Morris

Susan Morris — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:11:19 +0000

I appreciate your response. You are right, if a mea culpa is coming it needs to be from FB. Here’s the thing about passing it along without researching – there wasn’t much info available. And people were reacting to the relevant part – the part that was true, not the “FB is keeping this one quiet part,” although clearly since people didn’t know about it, the end result was that it was kept quiet, albeit unintentionally. I’m sure that for people who saw the update that was going around, then went to their privacy settings and learned that some of their information was available to the public without their prior knowledge, it would seem reasonable to pass along the warning to others. In the end, the warning was useful because helped many people and got their attention.

Coincidentally, there was a program on NPR recently, where the the author of the book, “Googled, The End of the World As We Know It,” Ken Auletta was interviewed. In the interview he mentioned FB and stated it’s possible for employers or potential employers to find anything a person has ever posted on FB. I don’t know how many FB users listened to that program, but it may have added to the hype.

By: Joanne Dolles

Joanne Dolles — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:19:43 +0000

Susan, I definitely agree we should be able to make our Pages private. I see no reason why that information needs to be automatically shown, except for the fact Facebook is looking to pull more brand name companies in for advertising revenue. If they are going to give us privacy options on indexing, they should be allowing us the option to show or not show fan pages as well.

As for a little “mea culpa”, I am not apart of Facebook so have zero reason to be defensive, as I did not make the changes. However, I am entitled to my own opinion. This article was written with facts, but some comments are my perspective and opinion. I don’t doubt that people were posting the rumor due to genuine concern, but what I can’t understand the blind “pass it on” that happens almost daily on Facebook, without anyone taking just a few minutes to see if the information is true or not…

By: Susan Morris

Susan Morris — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 17:05:00 +0000

People who wish to use their FB profile to promote themselves for professional reasons, and those who are job searching, should know that if one’s profile is searchable on FB, then all one’s fan pages can be seen by non-friends. This means that if an individual chooses to join fan pages of politicians, religious leaders and artists, a potential customer or employer can glean much personal information about an individual from reviewing the list of fan pages. I know people who have left some of their fave fan pages for this reason. Sometimes we wish to keep certain details about our tastes and preferences private.

I think it’s unfortunate that individuals do not have a choice in which fan pages can be viewed on their profile page if it is searchable by non-friends on FB.

Also, since FB locked everyone out of their pages until they read and updated their privacy options, and people STILL missed the detail about what it means if “everyone” can view certain things, then clearly FB missed the mark on their information campaign. People didn’t post that update to be hostile, they were genuinely concerned. Instead of going on the defensive and displaying a lack of empathy for these end users, a little bit of “mea culpa” would go a long way.

By: EM

EM — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 16:58:22 +0000

the options that were brought up when you went through Facebooks new privacy settings (if you clicked through their message instead of checking the settings directly) doesn’t actually show you that option.

Its only if you go through every screen of the privacy list that you will see it.

So it is worth letting people know even if the message is not quite correct in when it was announced etc.

By: Twitted by jeanhoyt

Twitted by jeanhoyt — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 13:46:41 +0000

[...] This post was Twitted by jeanhoyt [...]

By: Ellen Brown

Ellen Brown — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 11:18:06 +0000

This isn’t anything new. For as long as I’ve been on Facebook, there was a checkbox to include/not include your information in searches. I had mine set to ‘not include’ and it stayed that way through the change….my box was still ‘unclicked’. So all of these people who are so upset probably had their profile searchable all along.

By: Joanne Dolles

Joanne Dolles — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:40:51 +0000

I definitely agree that the default settings Facebook put into place were most likely for deeper motives… Like you said – to sell ads. But the point of this article was to point out the rumor being spread about ALL your info being indexed, which we know is not true.

I don’t know that they even have sent out any ePR, except for an alert posted at the top of the Privacy Settings page, indicating that the rumor is incorrect. If you have seen anything else distributed by them, I would love to see it. Thanks!

By: SocraticGadfly

SocraticGadfly — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:34:24 +0000

Uhh, as I’ve noted to friends who have posted on FB themselves about this rumor, true, it’s a rumor, but one that FB ultimately brought on itself with actual privacy policy changes designed to **lessen** your privacy if you follow FB’s default suggestions. AND, those changes were deliberate and part of a campaign that was first touted and trumpeted months ago.
Rather than just send out a e-PR saying the rumor isn’t true, we need FB to feel the pressure to the point it admits that, yes, it did try to expose more of our privacy in order to try to sell more ads.

By: Cathy Gould

Cathy Gould — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 07:28:19 +0000

Unfortunately, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick here. Sort of. It looked like one to me too, but as i tracked it, I couldn’t find it in any of the usual rumour-busting places. So, I kept tracking.
What set off this round of ‘rumours’ is the release of Google Real-Time Search. The first link is from a CNN report, which is about the only thing i found earlier with any specifics. The second link is the Google Blog where the roll-out was, actually kinda’ surreptitiously proclaimed. Who starts their day with the Google blog? Maybe we’d better.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/12/07/google.real.time.search/index.html

“…Facebook updates posted to public Facebook Pages will be indexed, while any Myspace update designated as public will appear in search results…”

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/relevance-meets-real-time-web.html

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Tue, 15 Dec 2009 06:07:48 +0000

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