[1010100101]

The problem here is the personal information is being voluntarily given to Facebook. And the FTC can do nothing about that.

As far as I can tell, most people using FB are trying to communicate with their friends (as they previously did via letter, telephone and email), not broadcast every personal detail and thought to potentially any person or organization connected to the web.

Alas they are not well informed that by sending all their communications through Zuckerberg's website, this is in effect what they are doing.

That lack of understanding is something the FTC can address.

So to comply with the FTC's requests, FB will make more disclosures.

But the problem remains. FB, whether intentionally or not, is receiving far too much private information and private conversation, and it's all being channeled over the web.

[sunchild]

Wrong. The FTC said very clearly that it thinks Facebook lured consumers in under false pretenses. That's punishable by criminal and civil penalties, in theory. The FTC usually settles these kind of cases, AFAIK. Sometimes there's money involved, sometimes not. Anyone who isn't in compliance with their own published privacy policy should be worried about the FTC; they can (again, in theory) do serious harm to a business – even one as big as Facebook.

[1010100101]

So are you suggesting that despite FB's rather sizeable legal budget and level of investment they will _still_ not be able to bring themsleves into compliance and stay that way? At least until the IPO. If Facebook even exists 20 years let alone 5 years from now I would be shocked. The data they've collected will of course probably have an infinite lifetime.

[sunchild]

In the US, given that they're not in a regulated industry (except to the extent they qualify as a site aimed at children), they really only need to comply with their own stated privacy policies. The question is: will they?

[1010100101]

I got a -1 on this comment, my worst score ever, but I still stand by it. I simply do not believe that anything one voluntarily submits to Facebook can be kept "private".

The value Facebook gets from the data is _sharing_ it with others: advertisers, various organisations devoted to catching bad guys, app developers, etc. It is not "private" by any stretch of the imagination.

Even if they purport to restrict access to a profile to certain users, a determined hacker can get around that.

This is a company that is trying to get into your email inbox at every possible opportunity. The concepts of "Facebook" and "privacy" are irreconcilable in my view. Even regardless of their ethics, there is an underlying architectural problem.

The successor to Facebook, which will offer real privacy, not the imaginary kind FB is pitching, will not be another centralised public website.