Details of 100 Million Facebook Users Compiled, Distributed Over Bit Torrent
July 29th, 2010Via: MSNBC:
The personal details of 100 million Facebook users have been collected and published online in a downloadable file, meaning they will now be unable to make their publicly available information private.
However, Facebook downplayed the issue, saying that no private data had been compromised.
The information was posted by Ron Bowes, an online security consultant, on the Internet site Pirate Bay.
Bowes used code to scan the 500 million Facebook profiles for information not hidden by privacy settings. The resulting file, which allows people to perform searches of various different types, has been downloaded by several thousand people.
This means that if any of those on the list decide to change their privacy settings on Facebook, Bowes and those who have the file will still be able to access information that was public when it was compiled.
Bowes’ actions also mean people who had set their privacy settings so their names did not appear in Facebook’s search system can now be found if they were friends with anyone whose name was searchable.
Nice.
So glad I never did the Facebook thingee.
Bad enough I have gmail.
Big brother-sister never gives up does he-she?
the fact that this so-called “social networking service” allows automated third-party scripts to harvest data proves that the owners/operators are (1) evil; (2) incompetent; (3) completely untrustworthy; and (4) intimately connected with a vast array of honeypot operations and spook agencies. there is no reason why an SNS would need to be open to wholesale third-party data harvesting. none. the fact that every government with privacy laws isn’t prosecuting the bastards surely shows that THEY find this whole thing rather convenient.