Is anyone continuing to use Facebook?

[Leg End]

Had an account, threw that shit in the trash years ago. Only used it to talk to a handful of people anyway, which I now do elsewhere. The message spying and data collection is extremely old news.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Part of the problem is the Facebook app on the phone listens in to phone-calls, emails and texts, even outside of Facebook. You use What'sApp for messaging, Facebook is taking a copy of those messages. You place a call, Facebook is logging to whom and for how long. You send an email, Facebook makes a copy.
Hell it came out Facebook was tracking people who didn't even have a Facebook through phone apps!

Can I get a source for this? How can Facebook possibly not be sued billions for this? Facebook is basically malware! Glad I don't have Facebook, or a cell phone.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Part of the problem is the Facebook app on the phone listens in to phone-calls, emails and texts, even outside of Facebook. You use What'sApp for messaging, Facebook is taking a copy of those messages. You place a call, Facebook is logging to whom and for how long. You send an email, Facebook makes a copy.
Hell it came out Facebook was tracking people who didn't even have a Facebook through phone apps!

Can I get a source for this? How can Facebook possibly not be sued billions for this? Facebook is basically malware! Glad I don't have Facebook, or a cell phone.

https://www.aclu.org/blog/privacy-technology/internet-privacy/facebook-tracking-me-even-though-im-not-facebook

The gist is that combined with tracking phone usage, Facebook creates what I'd call Dark-Profiles of people not on Facebook. For example, lets say I do have a facebook, you do not, and we meet up at a Star Wars Con. I take a selfie of SilentPony and Drathnoxis, and post it to my facebook. You do not have a facebook to link to, so facebook takes note of that, and cross-references with my contacts. Lets say your Mom in Chicago sends you a Facebook invite. Well now we know there's some who knows MomDrax and SilentPony and likes Star Wars and lives in Chicago. Now extrapolate my likes, ie liberalism, coffee, ponies, etc, with MomDrax's love of Thanksgiving, and chances are, without you having a facebook, Drathnoxis is from Chicago, likes Star Wars, thanksgiving, ponies, coffee and votes democratic. And that's from 2 people and a single photo
Imagine what it's like for a dozen people and hundreds of photos.

Facebook was tracking and selling that data for marketing.

 

[EvilRoy]

Part of the problem is the Facebook app on the phone listens in to phone-calls, emails and texts, even outside of Facebook. You use What'sApp for messaging, Facebook is taking a copy of those messages. You place a call, Facebook is logging to whom and for how long. You send an email, Facebook makes a copy.
Hell it came out Facebook was tracking people who didn't even have a Facebook through phone apps!

Wow, wow, wow, wait, what?

I was kinda like yeah whatever about this entire thing, rip to the ladies who sent nudes over messenger I guess but I don't sent dick pics so I'm good. But that last sentence is fucked up. Someone needs to go behind bars for that. Tracked without installing the app? Now how does that work?

The way it worked was the Facebook app comes pre-installed on phones, and cannot be uninstalled. And even without activating the app, without logging into Facebook through the app or creating a Facebook using the app, the app was already tracking phone usage.
So lets say you get a new iPhone. The facebook app goes 'Oh hey, Riseofthewhitewolf's new iPhone is on! Lets just see what he's doing and send his contacts back to facebook. He thinks that if he never uses me I can't track him, teehee'

It was very very insidious and Facebook still hasn't answered how it was legal and how its not stealing private data.

At least this explains why having the facebook app at all sucks the battery out of your phone like crazy. I got 3 more hours a day by jailbreaking and pulling it and a bunch of pre-added apps.

 

[dscross]

i mainly find facebook useful for organising things with people and keeping in contact with old friends who I don't necessarily have the numbers for anymore. i don't just randomly things post on it.

 

[RobertEHouse]

I read the terms of service a good hour read, years ago and realized it was not for me.

I didn't like the notion of your photos being used for Ad purposes without compensation or control.
Didn't like the wording they used for third party accessibility with the amount of data they were exposed to.

Also that a deleted accounts where not totally truly deleted and could be accessed.

https://www.quora.com/Can-Facebook-honestly-explain-how-long-they-store-data-from-deleted-accounts
https://turbofuture.com/internet/Obsolete-Facebook-Profile-Charade

In the end never signed up ,had other ways of communicating with my office and with my friends.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

I also don't own a smartphone. At least not one with an internet connection. An old one used as a camera mainly.

I'd be more bored without a smartphone. I commute about two hours a day. I mainly listen to music, using my HD 558 headphones. I've also started using an amp, the FiiO E12A. Over the last month, I watched all the Peanuts specials (ripped from my DVDs) and finished the Tom and Jerry Chuck Jones collection on the train, bus and during my lunch breaks. If I didn't have my smartphone, I'd just be staring at nothing for two hours a day and thinking bad thoughts.

I read books during my commute. I can heartily recommend it.

 

[Spade Lead]

Yes? What do I care? Not like I put anything I expect to be private on a social network.

Spying on chat is a bit more concerning, but even without any data sharing it's not like end to end encryption was ever advertised as a feature (right?), so the same reasoning applies. At the very least, the assumption was always that your "private" conversations were subject to Facebook's internal perusal.

Facebook is a tool, use your tools with discretion and use the right tool for the job.

OPSec. I don't have anything on my facebook I wouldn't want my ex to see, much less a government or ad agency

 

[Spade Lead]

Wow thats insanely scummy.

I have the Facebook app on my phone (installed of my own free will) and the thought of them reading my emails is a bit unnerving. Whatsapp and stuff not so much, sure the stuff I chat about is pretty private but its banal enough in the grand scheme of things to be of no interest I guess.

What stops me personally from being too alarmed by all this is that I strongly assume that I'm on 3 or 4 government watch lists already anyway (because of various memberships, downloading TOR, etc) so Facebook is just the cherry on top.

I doubt you're on any watch list. There actually aren't nearly as many as people think there are, and most of the time they tell you your on this list or that, and those lists come with legal restrictions, like the No Fly List or the Terrorist Watch List. And having TOR and doing darkweb stuff isn't nearly enough. Watch Lists and active surveillance are expensive to maintain, and are meant to lead to prosecutions, so unless you're doing actively illegal things online and think the van at the end of the block is watching you in preparation for a raid next week, you're fine.

I hope you guys don't have yahoo accounts anymore, because they are going to start doing the same thing, now. I do get encrypted e-mails so I will be canceling my Yahoo account

 

[EscapistAccount]

I'm still using it for a bit until I can convince people to migrate off it, I've got some social circles that use it so it'd be a problem until we have an alternative set up.

 

[stroopwafel]

I see governments infringing more and more on your privacy as a bigger problem than these dumb companies using the info you provided for user specific advertisements. Facebook is a multi-billion dollar corporation and their service is 'free' so what else are they going to make money from? You must be really ignorant if this comes as a surprise. The data hoarding of governments with their widespread interception of all internet communication and breach of wireless encryption in the name of 'national security' to be used against you at an unspecified date is probably more worrisome than a leaked nudie or dick pic. We live in an era that would be the gestapo's wet dream but as usual the media only gets riled up on trivial shit.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Facebook, like many other forms of social media should be considered "public information" and utilized as such at all times. Consider most forms of social media as a billboard that represents you to the general public, employers, potential clients, Judges and any other random person who may stumble across it. Honestly, it should be pretty generic as anything you say on such social media resources should at all times be considered permanent and can be used against you by anyone.

People need to fully understand that the internet is a very very public place. There is no such thing as "internet privacy" in reality. IF you do not want what you post online to be the determining factor as to whether or not you or some other guy gets the job, scholarship, client or research grant instead of you, make sure you never post anything online that would make them choose someone else over you. It is simple as that. If you want privacy, that is what a diary is for, the internet is just about as public and permanent as you can get and should be treated as such at all times.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Wow thats insanely scummy.

I have the Facebook app on my phone (installed of my own free will) and the thought of them reading my emails is a bit unnerving. Whatsapp and stuff not so much, sure the stuff I chat about is pretty private but its banal enough in the grand scheme of things to be of no interest I guess.

What stops me personally from being too alarmed by all this is that I strongly assume that I'm on 3 or 4 government watch lists already anyway (because of various memberships, downloading TOR, etc) so Facebook is just the cherry on top.

I doubt you're on any watch list. There actually aren't nearly as many as people think there are, and most of the time they tell you your on this list or that, and those lists come with legal restrictions, like the No Fly List or the Terrorist Watch List. And having TOR and doing darkweb stuff isn't nearly enough. Watch Lists and active surveillance are expensive to maintain, and are meant to lead to prosecutions, so unless you're doing actively illegal things online and think the van at the end of the block is watching you in preparation for a raid next week, you're fine.

I hope you guys don't have yahoo accounts anymore, because they are going to start doing the same thing, now. I do get encrypted e-mails so I will be canceling my Yahoo account

I am not sure why anyone would use a Yahoo account in the first place. Not only did they allow the government to spy on their accounts, I thought that it was originally made with back doors built in so employers could spy on their employees in the first place to ensure they were not "leaking" business information or doing anything illegal on company time. Yahoo has not ever been secure as far as I have been aware.I thought Yahoo and AOL were always known for being really bad about this early on.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

I find it too useful for keeping up with friends, plus events.

That and the LARPs I join typically organize over facebook, so if I want information about what's going on, or getting some sweet "downtime" action, I kinda need to be on it.

So I'm kinda stuck. :s

Pretty much this. I follow various groups and pages that post about things I'm interested in and the Facebook "Groups" are a function you can't get on Twitter or other social media apps. My friends and I have groups for game-night organization and other special event planning. My D&D campaigns have groups where we talk about planning the next session, discuss lore, and talk about the game. More and more people seem to be moving towards the bite-sized nature of Twitter but I'm more interested in being in contact with the people I care about rather than what Joe-Schmoe has to say in 160 characters.