Course Research Project part 3

An investigation on Facebook privacy issues

Trevor Henry

Liberty University

An Investigation on Facebook Privacy Issues

Part I – Topic Selection and Introduction

Facebook is an online social media platform and social networking service that has faced many privacy issues. Data privacy issues at Facebook culminated, especially in 2018, following revelations that some organizations had harvested user data and information for targeted advertisements. Cambridge Analytica Limited is a British strategic communication and political consulting organization involved in Facebook's data privacy issues. Cambridge Analytica was behind Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign and pro-Brexit Leave EU campaign. The company harvested and used data from Facebook users to execute the campaigns while targeting a specific population. Apart from Cambridge Analytica, other organizations also used the same techniques to gather personal data and information from Facebook users.

Generally, Facebook data privacy issues are centered on the gathering of personally identifiable data and information of more than 87 million Facebook users (Duarte, 2020). The prominent firm involved in the scandal is Cambridge Analytica. This firm and other organizations gained access to users' data. A combination of various factors contributed to this problem. The main issue contributing to the problem was the lack of adequate safeguards to ensure other organizations did not engage in data harvesting. Other factors contributing to the problem are users agreeing to uncertain terms and conditions, developer abuse of Facebook Application Programming Interface, and Facebook failed to oversee developers adequately.

Cambridge Analytica used a personality quiz application known as thisisyourdigitiallife app to collect personally identifiable data and information. The data and information collected using the application were used to create the users' psychographic profile (Sanders, & Patterson, 2018). Facebook users who added the application to their accounts and collected the quiz gave the developer the app the ability to access their profile information and user history. Moreover, the creator of the app was able to access the user's friends list and information. An example of information that was gathered was items that Facebook users and their friends like. From a Biblical viewpoint, Christians need to honor the need for privacy, but Facebook failed to do this. Researchers found out that the thisisyourdigitiallife app can accurately predict different sets of sensitive personal attributes such as political views, intelligence, sexual orientation, etc. This can be achieved if the app is used with a model that uses logistic regression and dimensionality reduction. The predictions of personal attributes are based on what users have liked and how frequently they like certain things.

Facebook has faced many privacy-related incidences for more than a decade, and this has mainly been attributed to insufficient and inadequate data privacy protection measures. The severity of the data privacy cases at an individual level varied; however, the sequence of the cases is an indication of systematic problems (Arora, & Zinolabedini, 2019). In 2007, Facebook was involved in a case that involved the violation of the Video Privacy Protection Act, whereby Beacon illegally used titles on Facebook News Feed. As a result, Facebook was forced to pay $9.9 million as compensation (Sanders, & Patterson, 2018). In 2011, Facebook promised to address data privacy issues. Facebook disclosed that the personal details of more than 6 million users had been exposed in 2013. In this scandal, users who downloaded their Facebook account history were able to obtain the details of their friends' email addresses and phone numbers. In 2018, a scandal involving the collection of data from more than 50 million Facebook users by Cambridge Analytica came to the limelight. An investigation was opened in March 2018 to examine if terms had been violated by Facebook (Sanders, & Patterson, 2018).

In February 2019, Facebook added a feature that allowed users to have the capability of deleting messages up to 10 minutes after sending a message. However, it was reported that Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg had deleted messages months after sending them, which was controversial. In June 2018, a report showed that Facebook did not honor its privacy policy because the data-sharing partnerships with mobile device providers such as Samsung and Apple were maintained. However, Facebook repudiated the claims indicating that device users were responsible for making their own decisions on the kind of information they share. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and Federal Trade Commission joined in 2018 to investigate the issue involving the Cambridge Analytica Facebook data scandal. A privacy loophole was reported in July 2018 whereby a Google Chrome plug-in known as Grouply.io enabled users to gain access to private Facebook group members' lists. More than 800 pages and Facebook accounts were deleted by Facebook in October 2018 for violating rules (Sanders, & Patterson, 2018).

In March 2019, Facebook announced its plan to improve its services around encryption and privacy. However, in the same month, there was a lapse in security whereby millions of passwords were stored in plain text. From a Biblical point of view, this is considered hypocritical. In Matthew 6, people should do good deeds covered rather than proclaiming them and failing to do so. Acts 5:41 also encourages people to do good deeds without fear. Facebook claimed that they would improve privacy for users, but they failed to do so. In July 2020, around 5,000 third-party developers were able to access user data without the users' consent. From a Biblical point of view, sharing users' data to third-party developers is wrong and unlawful because it failed to obey the data privacy policy and laws. According to Romans 13:3, people should fear authority and do what is right. The key organizations that are involved in the Facebook data privacy issues are Cambridge Analytica, SCL Group, Global Science Research, Emerdata, Onavo, Cubeyou, and Internet Research Agency. In conclusion, the case of Facebook privacy issues is a lesson for Christians to know the need to be responsible for their own and friends' information. Christians have a responsibility to protect the privacy of other people and take care of their privacy. From a Biblical viewpoint, truthfulness is significantly connected to privacy. Ephesians 4:25 emphasizes on the need to speak the truth.

Project Part II: Investigation and Review

Facebook is not the only company in the world that is faced with privacy issues that may result in the breach of privacy rights of the company customers. Although different companies are faced with similar privacy issues that are faced by Facebook, it is the duty and responsibility of Facebook Corporation management and leadership team to provide solutions to the privacy issues at the company (Cavusoglu et al. 2016). In many cases, organizations solve their privacy issues by implementing privacy laws and regulations which guide the handling of individual data found in their databases. In this regard, Facebook has implemented privacy policies that are aimed at providing a solution to its privacy problems. This section of the research project focuses on Facebook privacy policies and provides the best privacy policies enforcement mechanism that can be adopted by the company.

Description of Facebook's Privacy Policies

Facebook has one of the most comprehensive and watertight privacy policy which is also known as Data Use Policy. Based on the past experiences at the company that resulted in brushing aside of the customers' privacy concerns, Fcebook has broken down its privacy policy into fragments to make it easy to be comprehended by the company network users (Esayas, 2017). However, the Facebook privacy policy does not completely avoid the inscrutable legal jargon that is synonymous with privacy policies.

The first part of the company's privacy policy focuses on user privacy, information, and how the information and data are used. In this regard, Facebook has the right to access the information shared by the users and what other users share about other users. However, the company does not share the information with advertisers on the platform and other third-party users (Esayas, 2017). The company can also access user data from other sites without the owners' consent through its "Like" feature. Similarly, under this section, the Facebook Company allows its user to make specific information private or public. It is the discretion of the user to choose whether to make the information private or public through user-preferred settings. However, it is imperative to note that some information posted or shared on the network must be made public even if it is classified as private.

Any public information on the network that is public can be accessed by the public even if the users have no Facebook accounts. Facebook is an advertising platform and this is how it makes its revenues. However, as part of its data use policy, Facebook has outlined circumstances under which it is free to use users' information. This feature is confusing because the company does not explain in totality how it uses account holders' information but gives acute examples (Esayas, 2017). The company's privacy policy also allows the user to either choose to deactivate the account where information is put on pause or delete the account where all the information related to the user is deleted from the website and company databases.

The second part focuses on data sharing and as already mentioned, Facebook account holders reserve the right to dictate how the information is shared (Esayas, 2017). However, this part has not been configured well to promote privacy since the user can make the information private but friends may still make the information public through their comments and though photos, status update links the share and videos they share related to you. In this regard, it is recommended that users' friends should be restricted on how they can share any information that is classified as private (Avorgbedor & Liu, 2020, July). Similarly, users may hide their friend's list but the list will appear on friends' friends' list which also breaches the privacy of the users.

The third part of the Facebook privacy policy focuses on websites and third-party applications. Through its Facebook platform, games, websites, and other applications from third-party can access users' information without their consent (Isaak & Hanna, 2018). Most of the user information is spread through the application that the user uses and those utilized by friends. Facebook gives the user the right to accept applications that can access their data and also gives the user the right to restrict any information that friends' apps can access (Cavusoglu et al. 2016). However, the process is complex since it requires the user to uncheck all the categories application one by one which may be complex (Avorgbedor & Liu, 2020, July). In this regard, Facebook can easily ensure privacy in this perspective by creating a feature that offers blanket unchecking of such applications. Similarly, privacy has been enhanced in this regard by ensuring that only the account holder has the right to log in to other applications using Facebook accounts.

Concerning advertisements, Facebook gives all the advertisers access to the user information that is categorized as public (Avorgbedor & Liu, 2020, July). Advertisers can access information relating to their target demographics through information the users share on the website and others that are shared by friends. In this perspective, Facebook allows advertisers to access users' information as long as it is public (Nyoni & Velempini, 2018). Similarly, the Facebook privacy policy allows it to track your activities and that of your friends that relate to you. This is one way Facebook uses technology to collect private information in the name of using data to make it better. However, although the company may be sincere in this, privacy measures must be taken such as asking the user to consent to such practices.

Considering the shortfalls of the Facebook privacy policy, it is true to conclude that breach of privacy is enhanced by the friends of the account holders. Facebook as a company indeed gives the user the right to either make the information shared private or public but this is hindered by friends who spread information relating to their friends (Isaak & Hanna, 2018). From a biblical perspective, commands that relate to the privacy of other people's privacy can be drawn from Leviticus 19:16, "you shall not go around as a slander among your people." This verse may not seem to advocate for privacy on social media but it forbids gossip. Gossip has been described as a breach of privacy on Facebook and other social media and it is through gossip by the user friends that private information is made public on Facebook. Friends have the power to publicize other users' personal information and affairs on Facebook platforms without the consent or even the knowledge of the said persons.

References

Arora, N., & Zinolabedini, D. (2019). The Ethical Implications of the 2018 Facebook-Cambridge Analytica Data Scandal. Student Works.

Avorgbedor, F., & Liu, J. (2020, July). Enhancing User Privacy Protection by Enforcing Clark-Wilson Security Model on Facebook. In 2020 IEEE International Conference on Electro Information Technology (EIT) (pp. 155-161). IEEE.

Cavusoglu, H., Phan, T. Q., Cavusoglu, H., & Airoldi, E. M. (2016). Assessing the impact of granular privacy controls on content sharing and disclosure on Facebook. Information Systems Research, 27(4), 848-879.

Duarte, R. P. G. M. (2020). Case study: Facebook in face of crisis (Doctoral dissertation).

Esayas, S. (2017). Competition in dissimilarity: Lessons in privacy from the Facebook/WhatsApp merger. University of Oslo Faculty of Law Research Paper, (2017-33).

Isaak, J., & Hanna, M. J. (2018). User data privacy: Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, and privacy protection. Computer, 51(8), 56-59.

Leviticus 19:16

Nyoni, P., & Velempini, M. (2018). Privacy and user awareness on Facebook. South African Journal of Science, 114(5-6), 1-5.

Sanders, J., & Patterson, D. (2018). Facebook Data Privacy Scandal: A Cheat Sheet. TechRepublic. Retrieved from: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/facebook-dataprivacy-scandal-a-cheat-sheet/ .