As some of you may know, Facebook changed its privacy settings on Wednesday, December 16, 2009. However, the new “easy to use settings wizard” has not be well received. Among one of the issues, is that as a result of the change a user who did not adjust his/her privacy settings has been publishing his/her status updates and photos to the entire internet as of Wednesday. And while Facebook claims that only forty percent of its 220 million users have opted for their old privacy setting while the rest have embraced the change, critics argue that the settings wizard distorts the facts and that many users are not even aware of the true implications of the switch. Many critics have gone on to add that the change is really a deliberate attempt by Facebook to compete with other micro-publishing sites like Twitter who have capitalized on the public aspect of social networking sites.
So it came as no surprise this morning when the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a coalition of privacy groups, asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate Facebook’s recent privacy changes and how the social networking site treats customer data which they claim is in violation of federal consumer protection laws. The FTC has yet to comment on if and when it will investigate.