Facebook now denying access unless EU users opt-in to tracking

https://twitter.com/johnnyryan/status/993827965594202112

by fredley • 8 years ago

284 359 8 years ago

Lionsion6• 8 years ago

IIRC, the GDPR is very explicit about what constitutes valid consent, so things like pre-checked check-boxes aren't valid.

Is "consent" gained by a screen with only an "I agree" button even kosher by it?

fredley• 8 years ago

Absolutely not. This is Facebook basically goading the EU by obviously flouting the rules.

willsinclair2• 8 years ago

Later in the thread, he mentions that the consent they ask for doesn't really comply with the GDPR principles.

This appears to breach several important principles of the #GDPR, including the principle of purpose limitation, freely given, non-conditional consent, and of transparency. In other words, if Facebook attempts to collect consent in this manner, that consent will be unlawful.

ben509• 8 years ago

It may be that FB's lawyers come at it with a more American view whereby it's legal if it complies with the letter of the law. I suspect the Euro legal system tends to build a fence around the Torah, so to speak.

dbbk2• 8 years ago

It doesn't seem to comply with the letter of the law though, based on the requirement of "freely given, non-conditional consent".

mrec3• 8 years ago

That sounds backwards to me. Mainland European legal systems are based on civil law, which heavily emphasizes letter rather than spirit. (As opposed to the common law traditions found in most of the Anglosphere.)

TheCapn• 8 years ago

I would be absolutely shocked if Facebook didn't have european legal professionals hired to deal with this instead of having their American lawyers try to interpret foreign law.

icu• 8 years ago

The European regulatory view is often 'outcomes based' rather than the American 'rules based'. What I mean is that in the European approach, you might follow the rules, but fail in the outcome or 'the spirit' of the law. In that case, you have still broken the law. If you allow a gross generalisation, European regulators point to perverse outcomes in the US where morality is subverted by the law as a reason why this approach is better. There is however a much higher compliance cost in the EU than in the US due to this approach.

underko• 8 years ago

My guess is that GDPR is not yet in effect thus they can use this to get consent in advance. After GDPR is in place these will be changed to comply with it.

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

Then they will have to ask again with a fully GDPR-compliant opt-in procedure, after the 25th.

You cannot grandfather in user consent, especially not with a blatantly non-compliant procedure like this one.

Angostura5• 8 years ago

I shall wait a couple of weeks until GDPR is in force before logging in again. That will be interesting

mtgx• 8 years ago

I'm pretty sure that's illegal under GDPR.

zimpenfish2• 8 years ago

Yeah, they're fairly clear that you can't make service conditional on marketing et al consent.

When assessing whether consent is freely given, utmost account shall be taken of whether, inter alia, the performance of a contract, including the provision of a service, is conditional on consent to the processing of personal data that is not necessary for the performance of that contract.

Kiro2• 8 years ago

What if your service requires the tracking?

okmaybeyesno• 8 years ago

Facebook will argue that the data is necessary.

star-castle4• 8 years ago

what? seriously? Do EU citizens have some kind of legal right to Facebook access, now? It's illegal for Facebook to not serve people they can't sell to advertisers?

I'd love it if Facebook were nationalized (or destroyed), but none of the coverage of the GDPR made it sound like it was going in that direction. I thought it was just another stupid "click here to acknowledge our cookies" rule that was going to spam up the internet.

gonmf• 8 years ago

There is no legal right to Facebook, but if Facebook wants to do business here, it has to abide by our rules. And our rules are very simple, you cannot deny service because the user doesn't allow tracking if tracking is not necessary for your service to work. And it isn't in this case, it's only necessary to deliver higher paying ads.

Since they are being selective on the users they accept based on being tracked, they are now on track for another EU fine.

thefifthsetpin• 8 years ago

"I'd love it if Facebook were nationalized"

What you're looking for already exists; install WeChat.

zb123• 8 years ago

Please take a moment and consider the implications of a nationalized company that tracks and records every thought of its users.

Lionsion6• 8 years ago

what? seriously? Do EU citizens have some kind of legal right to Facebook access, now? It's illegal for Facebook to not serve people they can't sell to advertisers?

Facebook doesn't have a right to track people in the EU without gaining their consent to it in a way that complies with EU law.

EU citizens have a legal right to expect that Facebook will comply with European consumer protection laws.

If Facebook doesn't want to properly comply with EU regulations, they're free to totally withdraw from the EU market. Otherwise, it can expect penalties for its willful noncompliance.

mrweasel5• 8 years ago

I really do agree with you, a Facebook account isn't a right you have. You can just not use Facebook if you disagree with their terms of service.

The only problem is: Facebooks terms of service isn't really reasonable, and most people won't understand the implications. As I understand the GDPR one of the goals is to give users a set of rights, in regards to their data. These right cannot, under any circumstances, be violated, just as you can't bond yourself into slavery or sign away your right to free speech.

Facebook and others are currently trying to find loophole, like with the cookie-law, except this time the EU did it's homework and companies won't get of with such simple solutions. Really if Facebook believe they can't do business in the EU after the 25th of May, due to the GDPR, then they shouldn't. Just close of all EU activities. Of cause I understand why they won't, the company would lose a good chunk of it's value, but it will anyway if it can't find a way to legally operate under the GDPR.

zerostar076• 8 years ago

What do you consider legal under GDPR? A lot of people think it's some kind of "revenge gun", but for what exactly? I wonder what people expected that would happen.

adventured• 8 years ago

Here's the program so far: EU targets Google, US then targets German automakers with emissions-gate, EU targets US tech companies with global revenue fines and data restrictions (Google + Facebook = $180b in revenue in the near future, an EU targeted pot of gold meant to be an offset for Ireland's tax policies).

Next up: the US targets Germany's auto industry - a backbone to their economy - with tariffs or other import restrictions, seeking to damage BMW, Mercedes, and Volkswagen in any and all ways possible. Easy cover: Germany having the world's largest current account surplus, at 8% of GDP. Recourse after that: more restrictions, regulations, targeting of US tech giants in the EU, and tariffs on various US products.

France says: Germany and its trade policies are a problem, seeks to reduce German dominance while trying to remain more neutral with the US:

https://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macron-says-german-...

It's going to be a very interesting year or two.

willsinclair2• 8 years ago

Interesting. It seems like after the senate hearings, Facebook is trying to communicate to its users that sending them your data is a necessary part of using their services.

blahfuk• 8 years ago

It's how they pay the bills, to be fair. I don't think that's much of a secret anymore but looks like they're making it more explicit.

r00fus3• 8 years ago

You could make an argument that the malware that encrypted your /home folder is also "just a way to pay the bills".

In many jurisdictions that's illegal. EU is saying FB's approach is also illegal unless they make some key changes.

Personally, I hope FB just quits Europe.

bonsai80• 8 years ago

Yup. Perhaps this will eventually be a screen for the user to choose:

Button 1: Agree and proceed. Button 2: Set up credit card billing. Button 3: Close account.

r00fus3• 8 years ago

I'd be very interested in Button2.

thisacctforreal• 8 years ago

The Average Revenue per User can be found in their earnings report (linked above by ihumanable): https://s21.q4cdn.com/399680738/files/doc_financials/2018/Q1...

For US & Canada this was $86.65 in the last 4 quarters.

For Europe this was $34.95.

Keep in mind they likely don't target ads using just one person's data: accuracy can be improved by looking at the data of similar people, and looking at the data of friends and family. It isn't as simple as offering a $10/month plan to keep your privacy, because they want everyone's data.

"Your data is worthless, everyone's data is priceless."

hadrien012• 8 years ago

Just after that Terms screen I got three real consent screens (including one about ads tracking and one about face recognition). I think this screen is only about the TOS update.

probably_wrong2• 8 years ago

Same here. I think Facebook needs you to agree to the basic ToS, to then move on to your acceptance/refusal of tracking.

My guess is that "we can silently change our ToS at any time" is no longer possible, and that's why you cannot login without agreeing first.

Nullabillity• 8 years ago

Weird. I only got the facial recognition screen and the "accept ToS or delete your account" one.

jacquesm5• 8 years ago

I guess the option 'continue to use the service without tracking' was too hard to implement technically. Or maybe nobody thought of that.

hadrien012• 8 years ago

You might have already configured (and disabled) ad tracking when privacy options went up a few months back?

Angostura5• 8 years ago

Yet, you are required to agree to the TOS without seeing the TOS. I wouldn’t have thought this was enforceable

kevin_b_er• 8 years ago

Facebook knows it is in the wrong. Facebook announced last year they weren't going to use Ireland as part of its tax dodging scheme. Otherwise GPDR rulings could just extract global money out of the Ireland tax funnel.

zerostar076• 8 years ago

I doubt they released this without consulting the relevant data agencies in the EU. And TBH there is nothing shocking here, just a confirmation of what everybody knows is already happening.

I 'm also in the EU and this makes perfect sense to me: if you can't accept seeing some ads then you can't use the free service. I highly doubt people are willing to pay $5 cash / quarter to use it, but i would like to see FB giving that option, just to see how miserably it fails.

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

According to GDPR, you cannot make access to your service require opt-in to tracking, unless your service very specifically cannot work in any way without tracking. And no, your business model not working because you cannot track users anymore is not the same as your service not working. Find a better business model.

Facebook would still work just fine without the tracking, as proven by the fact that you can switch off targeted ads and everything still works fine.

Havoc• 8 years ago

Do you consent to this cavity search? (Required to board plane)

star-castle4• 8 years ago

That's basically how it works in the US, yes.

Tharkun4• 8 years ago

Not just the US. Most of the western world has incredibly invasive security theatre in airports and train stations now.

briandear3• 8 years ago

Ever flown from Istanbul? I was searched three separate time, including just to enter the airport. Implying that this is a US thing is not accurate.

ClassAndBurn2• 8 years ago

GDPR doesn't cover enough of the population using Facebook to warrant such a change to their business model where you can use the service without them using your data. They believe they are entrenched enough to just require this (and likely are for many EU residents).

purple-again2• 8 years ago

I'm really curious to find out if the GDPR privacy stance (I'm American, not well traveled, and with no non american social circle) is like the 'no JavaScript' community. Vastly over represented in the tech community and not really representative of the population as a whole.

In other words, are 99% of European citizens going to just click through what ever annoying prompts they have to in order to get to their facebook (thats what I would do) or is there an actual widespread cultural difference in the EU that would stop large segments from agreeing to this.

barrkel2• 8 years ago

The click-through is itself likely violating the regulation. All it takes is for someone to complain; it's not enough for 99% of people to click through.

rorykoehler2• 8 years ago

I think most will just click through. I know I will. However there is probably a larger percentage of Europeans who won't compared to Americans.

called_it• 8 years ago

At least for some, it's the result of experiences with and/or knowledge about Stalinism, the Nazis, et al. For those, it doesn't matter what 99% of the people do, we don't derive the value of something from how many people do or think it, we derive the value of people from what they think and do in relations to these questions. It's fine to be "not well traveled", but I wouldn't put my hand into machinery I don't 100% understand. That you don't see what is the lioness and what are the cubs is not relevant to the lioness.

r00fus3• 8 years ago

I think the current population that wants GDPR privacy stance is small but feared to be influential by Facebook.

It also coincides with FB's recent privacy breach news and overall general public dissatisfaction with FB's policies.

I know a lot of folks who simply don't use FB and are realizing that it's "really not free" in liability terms.

So does this turn into a groundswell? Probably not, I agree with you. However, it does put some fences up that is probably causing FB to feel a bit more nervous. GDPR may be the first of many such efforts...

Angostura5• 8 years ago

There are so many people undergoing GDPR workplace training at the moment that I think people may stop and think

rahoulb• 8 years ago

In business circles there appears to be widespread panic about GDPR.

Amongst "ordinary" people, there is a growing sense of unease about data collection - reflected in the "Facebook must be listening to my phone because they overheard a conversation I was having and now I'm seeing ads for it".

I believe people are starting to understand the implications of data collection and are quite unhappy about it.

zerostar076• 8 years ago

In reality, caring so much about their privacy seems to be a German/Nordic thing. There was no public outcry that led to GDPR , it seems to have popped up more through bureaucracy rather than popular demand. I think most europeans are just as oblivious/indifferent to privacy issues as americans, and we don't even have the CA scandal here. So yes, 99% will just press accept and forget about it. It's mainly the vocal proponents that you hear.

noja• 8 years ago

Are you talking with real knowledge of the facts, or is this a guess?

Because my guess would be that it would be cheaper to adhere to the rules rather than let a competitor grow big in Europe and eat their market elsewhere.

kungtotte• 8 years ago

With over 500 million people in the EU that's a lot of potential market going to waste by not being GDPR compliant.

Unless, of course, their central business model is incompatible with GDPR-compliance in the first place...

_rpd2• 8 years ago

But the 'competitor' will have much lower revenue than Facebook because of the lack of targeted advertising.

ClassAndBurn2• 8 years ago

Its a guess. Facebook also controls many of the "competitors" currently. Its also not about not being compliant, they want their customers, its just not worth reevaluating core aspects of the business when they believe people will sign whatever they have to to continue using Facebook.

emiliobumachar• 8 years ago

They also have to consider the risk that complying too much will inspire copycat regulations

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

As far as I know, the GDPR stipulates that you cannot deny people access to you service if they do not opt-in to tracking, unless the service you provide is very specifically a tracking service.

Tracking is not the primary service Facebook provides to their users, so the GDPR will not allow them to bar access for users who do not opt-in to being tracked.

lainga2• 8 years ago

I believe the GDPR only forbids denying access to users' data if they don't opt-in (Art. 15), and that's why Facebook has the options to either

- accept ToS and use Facebook, or

- deny ToS, download user data and delete account (under 'More options').

https://gdpr-info.eu/art-15-gdpr/

frockington4• 8 years ago

And how would Europe make an American company offer services to Europeans? Is there a legal pathway to do this or would their court summons be used to level out chairs in FB HQ?

Lionsion6• 8 years ago

GDPR doesn't cover enough of the population using Facebook to warrant such a change to their business model where you can use the service without them using your data.

The real question isn't population, it's revenue per user. An typical American or a European will draw a lot more revenue to Facebook than a typical person from a 3rd world country accessing Facebook through "Free Basics."

My educated guess is that Europe is Facebook's #2 market behind the US, and there's enough revenue there for them to change their business model.

ihumanable• 8 years ago

No need to guess, they are a public company and just released their 2018 Q1 Quarterly Earnings Report

https://s21.q4cdn.com/399680738/files/doc_financials/2018/Q1...

From Slide 5:

Q12018: Europe was #2 with $3.036B in revenue

Q42017: Europe was #2 with $3.250B in revenue

And so on, it looks like every quarter on this slide has Europe in spot #2 behind US & Canada.

tonyjstark2• 8 years ago

Is it possible to delete my facebook account without consenting to usage of my data? So can I access the delete page without consent?

icebraining24• 8 years ago

You can try: https://www.facebook.com/help/delete_account

znpy• 8 years ago

I'm gonna guess that no, you can't. That's what I would expect from Facebook.

mrweasel5• 8 years ago

Greate, so now my account will just exist in some state of limbo...

losvedir• 8 years ago

Or, you could just not respond if you don't know the answer.

unvoterabbit• 8 years ago

Don’t they still track you even if you don’t have an account?

Shish2k2• 8 years ago

If you scroll down the twitter thread, you can see clicking "other options" instead of "accept" gives you a screen saying "if you don't want to accept the new TOS, click here to download a copy of your data and delete your account"

tonyjstark2• 8 years ago

Thanks, I was at work and didn't want to read the whole thing. I searched for "delete" but nothing showed up in my browser...

shmerl2• 8 years ago

Hopefully it will encourage some people to ditch FB.

Rjevski• 8 years ago

I wish, but knowing the general public they’ll just see this as yet another screen to click through to get their daily dose of bullshit memes, game invitations from their “friends” and other bullshit.

drivingmenuts• 8 years ago

Hopefully it will encourage some people to ditch FB.

I know my reasons for wanting to ditch FB personally (I'm about 50/50 on that), but I'm curious as to your reasons for wanting others to dump it.

shmerl2• 8 years ago

There was a good article about it, but Observer swallowed it.

Here is what remained: https://web.archive.org/web/20151011192709/http://observer.c...

Basically, anyone using it, encourages more people to use it, thus causing further damage.

gagabity• 8 years ago

Whats behind that Options link?

carrja993• 8 years ago

Believe me folks, just delete facebook. I've been so much happier since I did.

juxncxrlos• 8 years ago

What about memes pages? that's the only reason I keep my account. Also, I don't even see adds with and Ad-blocker. What are they going to try to sell me, a meme page subscription?

mozumder3• 8 years ago

What about memes pages? Memes pages seem like the best reason to delete Facebook.

inetknght• 8 years ago

They aren't trying to sell you anything. They are selling you to others.

They are selling you to not just advertisers but selling your profile to companies that are able to use your profiled information to make their own decisions about things.

It's not just about advertisements. Imagine if you didn't serve a single advertisement and instead bought profiling information about people. You could use that profile information to make business or political decisions regardless of whether an advertisement was sold.

You could influence politics because you "know" your target audience.

Say, for example, the US presidential election or Brexit. Those are just the most high profile places for your profile to be used without ever having presenting advertisement to you.

Net neutrality is another one.

dan1234• 8 years ago

Most of the memes will have been copied from Reddit anyway.

quantummkv• 8 years ago

What about memes pages? that's the only reason I keep my account.

Directly go to reddit or 4chan. Everything on facebook is 7 day old trash from reddit.

Also, I don't even see adds with and Ad-blocker. What are they going to try to sell me, a meme page subscription?

You don't see it does not mean facebook does not track you and is not interested in selling stuff to you. It will just use your data to sell stuff to your family members.

favorited• 8 years ago

Did you archive your data before deleting? If so, how did it work?

I haven't signed in for years, but I have stuff on there going back to high school (back when you had to have an education email address to make an account, now that I think about it) which I'm sure would be fun to look through down the road.

olliej• 8 years ago

I downloaded the archive and then deleted my account. There were some pictures and videos I’d forgotten about which was nice, but given I’d already stopped using it, why leave the account around?

carrja993• 8 years ago

It generates a zip of all your photos and posts (I guess) that you can download.

EastSmith• 8 years ago

It is clear that FB does not plan to be GDPR compliant [1]

https://medium.com/@bozhobg/facebook-doesnt-plan-to-be-gdpr-...

jacquesm5• 8 years ago

Well, they had a chance. It's a bit like the Titanic aiming straight for the iceberg but in this particular case I don't feel sorry.

newscracker4• 8 years ago

I for one would gleefully welcome it sinking. I'd probably throw a large party to many people if, by that time, we have a great privacy focused alternative too (preferably decentralized).

Facebook has become a social justice issue (to steal a strong phrase).

donatj6• 8 years ago

Denial of service is a perfectly valid route to GDPR compliance.

brador2• 8 years ago

Is it? If they hold personal data of EU citizens in a shadow profile they must allow a way to view and correct or delete it.

Head in sand like this approach will remain unacceptable to EU.

icebraining24• 8 years ago

Only if the personal data is necessary to provide the service. And "my business model makes it necessary" doesn't cut it. Otherwise you need consent, but you can't DoS if it's denied.

EDIT: removed wrong link.

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

Fuck 'em, then. We functioned perfectly fine before FB started, and we will function perfectly fine after FB is gone.

xxpor2• 8 years ago

The maximum penalty is 4% of WW revenue, right? What happens if FB just decides to pay that in perpetuity?

apexalpha• 8 years ago

Then after 25 cases they'd be bankrupt for the year.

brightball• 8 years ago

So basically Facebook is saying that if we can’t make money from you, you can’t have an account.

wang_li2• 8 years ago

Seems perfectly reasonable, doesn't it?

zzzcpan2• 8 years ago

No, facebook desperately needs to keep users and keep tracking them, so they are abusing network effect monopoly into giving people a choice either accept any tracking facebook wants or lose all the connections and all the time you invested into the platform. Which is not much of a choice, obviously.

Faaak• 8 years ago

What's wrong with that ? I mean, FB is a free service.

(I don't have a FB account)

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

Nope, the GDPR does not consider a flawed business model to be a valid reason to breach users' privacy.

Tehnix• 8 years ago

I'm actually much more interested in what Google collects about me. At least for me, it's somewhat transparent that Facebook tries to slurp up all they can, but it's much less clear with Google, that seems to try to downplay that they are in fact also, heavily reliant on your data.

Does anyone know if Google has made any statements on this?

newscracker4• 8 years ago

If you'd like to see what Google has about you, you can visit https://www.google.com/settings/takeout (or search for "Google Takeout"). Google has maintained and updated its own solution to export data it has collected from you, the user.

While I do trust Google more than I trust Facebook, I also actively avoid giving information to Google (through various practices).

zzzcpan2• 8 years ago

If websites are going to ask for consent to tracking or deny access to the service only allowing to take the data, delete account and leave, the whole thing will become meaningless. Users will just learn to blindly accept everything, as this is a huge annoyance to them.

_rpd2• 8 years ago

Yes, I thought that the GDPR was explicitly drafted to ensure it wouldn't just become a "more annoying cookie law."

Edit: they are doing this before the May 25th deadline.

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

The GDPR does not allow you to make access contingent on PII data collection, unless your service cannot possibly work without it.

gamblor956• 8 years ago

I'm not sure why you keep spreading this FUD. The GDPR applies to all personal data, not just tracking data, and Facebook is useless without your personal data. IOW, FB can make access contingent upon agreeing to data collection.

jacquesm5• 8 years ago

Blackmail isn't opt-in.

donatj6• 8 years ago

With how insanely in depth some of the restrictions are, I'll honestly be surprised if this isn't the route a lot of companies end up taking to GDPR compliance.

KozmoNau728• 8 years ago

You mean completely flouting the regulations and muddying the waters by putting up ToS compliance popups that don't have anything to do with GDPR, in order to fool their users?

donatj6• 8 years ago

I simply mean having a contract indemnifying the company against GDPR, e.g. the user giving consent, to simply use the site.

Same as the cookie situation Europe has, but more so.

bprasanna• 8 years ago

Mark's attitude during the Cambridge Analytica issue very well reflected the fact that: Users are not going to stop using FB, so why bother much about bending the company rules, instead bend the users.

newscracker4• 8 years ago

Things like this make me very, very angry! So many missteps over the years. So many things bungled. So many dark patterns to fool users. Yet, where is the mass exodus of employees from Facebook? If you're still working in any company that Facebook owns in the technology or privacy or legal front, don't you realize what harm you're contributing to? And you're still ok with that? Don't you have a choice?

I'm appalled that thousands of people still work for this company by choice.

pgwhalen• 8 years ago

Even though you never hear the counterpoint on HN, it’s important to remember that FB’s behaviors are not necessarily objectively bad - people can have different views on these things.

newscracker4• 8 years ago

I agree that people can have different views on these things for various reasons. But I don't see how "FB's behaviors are not necessarily objectively bad", unless one considers only the profit motive as prime without giving any thought to other factors. Can you expand on that?

sudouser3• 8 years ago

Facebook is a textbook on dark ux and addiction

yayana• 8 years ago

An employee Exodus would require a drastic surprise for those paying close attention to the company.

For various reasons, I would estimate Google and Microsoft have historically had the possibility of recruiting from about half the senior Engineers in my niche.. Facebook and Amazon are a bit lower, maybe as low as a quarter.

For companies bought by these companies there is a general readjustment as up to about half the engineers who would have refused a job offer from them leave while trying to take the most value in vesting schedules and line up something elsewhere.

The "Exoduses" from incompatible buyouts don't really make headlines because 50% over ~3 years with replacement is hard to see from the outside and most tech mergers are catastrophes if both companies' lines were actually supposed to remain profitable.

teaneedz• 8 years ago

Exactly my feelings. Until devs and support staff stop contributing to the harm, I'll continue to fight their policies. For me, real social is happening on E2EE messaging with Wickr and Signal.

gnode3• 8 years ago

Given the turnover rate of employees in the valley, I think most employees currently working for Facebook probably joined with a similar perception of it as people have today. Which is to say: most people who find Facebook's business practises incompatible with their ethics filtered themselves out before applying.

siruncledrew• 8 years ago

The devs are basically soldiers following the chain of command. The devs aren't going to do much unless they are threatened themselves because they get to enjoy rich, comfy lives as a result of their association to FB. It's easy to put blinders on to the rest of the harm they are contributing to when they don't really suffer from the impact of their work (or convince themselves they are doing the right thing).

As a modern analogy, imagine Erdogan's military and bodyguards. With all the global news on the matter, it's evident they are causing a lot of oppression to many people and basically contributing to a dictatorship, yet they still do as they are told from the top because their own benefit depends on it. Hell, he even got them to suppress a coup threatening his own power.

In order for FB to really change, it needs to change from the top. Otherwise, it's a massive effort to convince everyone at the bottom to push back against the top and threaten their own job security. The reality is Zuck, Andreessen, and the other board members at the top don't care to change, because changing for the benefit of their users also means less riches for themselves.

summerdown2• 8 years ago

I wonder how this will co-exist with

a) Tracking non-facebook users via Facebook icons on web pages, and

b) Storing the information of non-users such as photos other people take, phone books other people upload, etc?

tinus_hn• 8 years ago

If that means they will no longer track me if I’m not a Facebook user, I’m all for it!

Facebook now denying access unless EU users opt-in to tracking

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