{"id":5405,"date":"2019-01-14T14:10:02","date_gmt":"2019-01-14T14:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocialelement.agency\/us\/?p=5405"},"modified":"2019-01-14T14:10:02","modified_gmt":"2019-01-14T14:10:02","slug":"facebook-latest-privacy-scandal-matter-to-users","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocialelement.agency\/us\/facebook-latest-privacy-scandal-matter-to-users","title":{"rendered":"Does Facebook\u2019s latest privacy scandal matter to users?"},"content":{"rendered":"
Facebook continues to be besieged by privacy issues. In December, it came to light that more than 150 companies (including Amazon, Netflix and Spotify) could access private message data from Facebook Messenger. While Facebook claims that all data is shared with users\u2019 permissions, a report from the <\/span>New York Times<\/span><\/a> says that the level of access went beyond what users believed they\u2019d signed up for, even if they\u2019d given the appropriate permissions. We assume, after all, that private messages are exactly that. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n In April 2018, Mark Zuckerberg gave his assurance to the House of Representatives that Facebook users have complete control over what they share. That looks increasingly unlikely as Facebook hits the headlines again and again for inadequate privacy protections. Much of 2018 was spent cleaning up access rights to third parties, and at best, it seems that it has lost track of where user data ends up. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Does any of this change anything for Facebook? Every now and then, headlines light up with news that people are leaving Facebook. But the numbers never quite materialise. A few people here and there might go. Some go instead to Instagram – presumably not realising or not caring that the two are linked. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Facebook itself <\/span>said <\/span><\/a>that it hadn\u2019t seen \u201cany meaningful impact\u201d on user behaviour in the months following the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018, although users are starting to take their privacy settings more seriously. Globally, its user base is growing. But fewer teens are joining than ever before, and ultimately any platform needs younger users to join, to secure its future. Ironically, they\u2019re all using Instagram – so this is probably a <\/span>platform preference<\/span><\/a> rather than a data privacy issue. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n