Friday, September 11, 2009

Facebook Capitulates in Privacy Law Face-Off

Facebook, Inc. has reached agreement with the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada regarding privacy controls on the social networking website. As we previously reported, the Office found that several of Facebook's practices violated Canada's Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act. The Office gave Facebook 30 days to address the concerns or face court action. Facebook has now consented to several significant changes, including a more forthcoming description of its Privacy Policy; more granular privacy settings; a permissions-based model for third-party applications (e.g., games and quizzes) that allows users to select the information they share with third parties; and the clear option to either "deactivate" or entirely "delete" an account.

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