Facebook is not the sort of company that is widely known for giving people a great deal of privacy while they use their service. In fact, it’s fair to say that Facebook has really alienated most if not all of its users by making them feel like they can’t get any real privacy on the platform.
Since this is the sort of thing that would make most users abandon the platform, Facebook has been trying quite hard to make it so that all users know that their privacy needs are being taken care of. From long social media posts to sending executives to digital privacy panels, Facebook has made quite a show with regards to it supposedly changing its behavior, but the fact of the matter is that there is a very good chance that Facebook is pretty much only doing this so that people stop criticizing it.
Back in 2014, the social media platform announced its privacy checkup feature, a feature that was ostensibly meant to make it easier for you to see if your privacy was being affected in anyway. This feature has been useful in some ways, and Facebook has now announced that it will be updating it in order to make it even better for anyone that might be thinking of using it at any given point in time.
The main problem here is a structural one. Facebook can apply all of the band-aid solutions that it wants to, people are still going to call it out on the kind of money it is making by utilizing user data and completely ignoring aspects of user privacy that it should be trying to take as seriously as possible. Toolkits such as the one that Facebook is updating are good in their own way but they don’t truly solve the problem at hand.
The privacy toolkit doesn’t really give you as much control over your data as you might expect. Indeed, many would say that it doesn’t do much at all, and Facebook still hasn’t allowed you to opt out of certain methods that they use in order to obtain data. Most of the time users need to try and understand that Facebook isn’t going to be on your side. It’s a big corporation that is only interested in money, so users need to make sure that their voices are heard and that they can hold Facebook to task whenever possible.
Read next: How The Birth of Fake Like Factories Is Destroying The Facebook
Since this is the sort of thing that would make most users abandon the platform, Facebook has been trying quite hard to make it so that all users know that their privacy needs are being taken care of. From long social media posts to sending executives to digital privacy panels, Facebook has made quite a show with regards to it supposedly changing its behavior, but the fact of the matter is that there is a very good chance that Facebook is pretty much only doing this so that people stop criticizing it.
Back in 2014, the social media platform announced its privacy checkup feature, a feature that was ostensibly meant to make it easier for you to see if your privacy was being affected in anyway. This feature has been useful in some ways, and Facebook has now announced that it will be updating it in order to make it even better for anyone that might be thinking of using it at any given point in time.
"We updated Privacy Checkup to guide you through important privacy settings on Facebook. The revamped Privacy Checkup tool has expanded to four distinct topics to help you strengthen your account security and control who can see what you share and how your information is used. We know privacy is personal and we’ve integrated privacy tips to help you make the right privacy decisions for you.", announced Facebook in a blog post.All of that being said, most users are going to be taking this news with a grain of salt because we all know that Facebook says one thing with regards to its use of user data and then don't necessarily fulfill its all promises.
The main problem here is a structural one. Facebook can apply all of the band-aid solutions that it wants to, people are still going to call it out on the kind of money it is making by utilizing user data and completely ignoring aspects of user privacy that it should be trying to take as seriously as possible. Toolkits such as the one that Facebook is updating are good in their own way but they don’t truly solve the problem at hand.
The privacy toolkit doesn’t really give you as much control over your data as you might expect. Indeed, many would say that it doesn’t do much at all, and Facebook still hasn’t allowed you to opt out of certain methods that they use in order to obtain data. Most of the time users need to try and understand that Facebook isn’t going to be on your side. It’s a big corporation that is only interested in money, so users need to make sure that their voices are heard and that they can hold Facebook to task whenever possible.
Read next: How The Birth of Fake Like Factories Is Destroying The Facebook
