Facebook users are upset again, this time over how difficult it is for users to completely remove themselves from the social network. In fact, so difficult is the process that Facebook users founded a
new group, "How to permanently delete your Facebook account." While users have the option to deactivate their accounts, the accounts themselves aren't deleted from Facebook's servers; rather, the
information is stored indefinitely. Said one user who unsuccessfully tried to delete his Facebook account: "It's like the Hotel California. You can check out any time you like, but you can never
leave." The same user exchanged emails with Facebook representatives for months about permanently deleting his information; the company only relented when he threatened legal action--although one
reporter claims to have recently found his supposedly deleted profile.
This is only the latest outcry over the site's use of personal data. A new advertising system called "Beacon," unveiled
in November, would track a user's purchases or transactions on certain third party sites and then broadcast that information to that user's friends, unless that user chose to opt-out of the service.
The new program angered so many of the site's users that CEO Mark Zuckerberg issued a public apology and then changed Beacon into an opt-in service.
Read the whole story at New York Times »
