Facebook has 30 days to comply with new recommendations from the Canadian Privacy Commissioner to keep our private information private. The latest from the National Post:
Privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart said the social network violates federal law by storing the personal information of its 250 million global users indefinitely, even after users deactivate their accounts, and that the privacy information contained on the site is often confusing or incomplete.
Some might wonder why the feds are being such party poopers towards the darling of the social media set (well, at least it was until Twitter showed up). I've said before that our expectation of privacy has changed irrevocably and that future generations are going to have a tough time understanding how we saw these issues before the world got wired.
But low expectation of privacy isn't necessarily no expectation of privacy. We do have laws to protect our private information and they're not necessarily philosophically out of date or impractical. Why should Facebook keep your profile information after you cancel your account? Why is a company with such a huge following and potential for future earnings incapable of keeping privacy information consistent across its website? I'm not convinced this move by the feds is overreach.
