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As you probably know already, Facebook is one of the biggest social networks at the moment. But do you know the risks of taking part of it?

First let’s talk about information leakage. All of the data you place on facebook is all permanently of their property unless you delete your account, which was virtually impossible until a few months ago. Now you can beg and pleed the facebook staff to delete it for you, which in my oppinion is completly ridiculous. Why don’t they place a “delete account” button instead of the “suspend account” one? And, why do you have spend time to delete every single minifeed before they delete your account? Moving on, let’s asume you got your account deleted. Do you know facebook still has plenty of your data? Why? Because you agreed to the “terms and condition” which makes you agree to the following:

“You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.”

Creepy, right? If that wasn’t enough, they end the lovely policy by chaining your info eternaly to them…

“You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content.

The following sections will survive any termination of your use of the Facebook Service: Prohibited Conduct, User Content, Your Privacy Practices, Gift Credits, Ownership; Proprietary Rights, Licenses, Submissions, User Disputes; Complaints, Indemnity, General Disclaimers, Limitation on Liability, Termination and Changes to the Facebook Service, Arbitration, Governing Law; Venue and Jurisdiction and Other.”

Basically anything you put on facebook is now of their property… You agree to arbitration, which means you can’t appeal to court…. Yeah, it sucks!

Now let’s assume that you choose to create an account either because of work, college or any other reason. A friend of yours sends you a quiz, a common thing on facebook, you will probably say yes. This will take you to a new page with a big blue button saying “add app.”  When you click that button you agree to give a third party all your information. Here is what you agree to:

“Facebook Platform does not give Developers access to your e-mail address, personal website, instant messenger ID, telephone number or street address (”Contact Information”). Facebook will only disclose your Contact Information to third parties in accordance with the Facebook Policy”

Basically you give a third party almost everything…

Also, unless you manually change it friends of your friends can see your info? At first I thought that was only 1 chain away, but its not, its all the friends of your friends and then the friends of your friend’s friends etc…  So, if your friend’s friend is a stalker he will stalk you… Lovely!

Wrapping this up… I do not hate facebook, I just think it could use some changes and imitate some things other social networks have… Facebook can be a very useful tool but it is very difficult to use with minimum risk.

Written by: Swamp Moon