March 19, 2012 at 5:29 PM ET
Now's your big chance to see Facebook's recent settlementwith the Federal Trade Commission in action!
Facebook is revising its Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, for the first time in nearlya year, and you have until March 22 topipe up with your beefs, The Next Web reports. You can find the notice on theofficial Facebook site governance page you probably didn'teven know existed. Until now:
Today, we’re letting you know of some changes we proposefor the Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, an important document thatdescribes our relationship with users and others who interact with Facebook.Many of the changes are administrative (for instance, replacing references toour “Privacy Policy” with “Data Use Policy”) and others make our practices andpolicies more clear.
As part of last year's settlementwith the FTC, Facebook must now "get consumers’ approval before it changes the way it shares their data, andrequires that it obtain periodic assessments of its privacy practices byindependent, third-party auditors for the next 20 years." So now's your big chance.
What's on the docket for your approval? A lot of updatedlanguage to go with the Timeline-optimized Facebook. For example:
"PrivacyPolicy" is now "Data Use Policy," which you have to admit,is a lot more accurate what with "privacy" officially an antiquated notion these days.
Theprevious statement regarding your info available to third-party applications hasbeen updated to include that your info that might be shared not directly by you, but by your friends who useapplications. We've bolded the new wording so you can see what I mean:
"When you or others who can see your content and information use an application,your content and information is shared with the application."
The fact that an application used by your friend has access to the info you share with that friend is nothing new, but now that fact is stated clearly.
Facebook also added added this detailed wording regarding the permission you give to mobile devices:
"You provide consent and all rights necessary to enableusers to sync (including through an application) their devices contact listswith any basic information and contact information that is visible to them onFacebook, as well as your name and profile picture. "
And now there'sthis (which will now officially apply to users and non-users who interact withFacebook):
"Some or all of Facebook’sservices and features may not be available to users in certain geographicareas. We reserve the right to exclude or limit the provision of any service or feature in our sole discretion."
And of course, in the section titled "Other," this addition:
"We reserve all rightsnot expressly granted to you."
You can see the tracked changes on Facebook's Statement of Rights and responsibilities here.
And you can comment on those changes, here.
But hurry! You've only got until Friday. For what it's worth.
Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.
