• The New York Times, Friday, November 9, 2007 11 AM

The New York Times' Saul Hansell opened a can of worms yesterday when he pointed out that Facebook's new advertising approach--which is to have friends basically advertise products and services to each other --could be illegal in the state of New York under a 100-year-old privacy law. The statute in question reads: "any person whose name, portrait, picture, or voice is used within this state for advertising purposes or for the purposes of trade without the written consent first obtained" can sue.

Is opting-in the same thing as written consent? It's not an end-user licensing agreement, but should it be? Facebook is, in fact, appropriating the use of another's likeness for its own benefit, as is the advertiser. In the real world, advertisers use stock photos taken of models that consent to have their images used in ads. Here no contract has been signed, but perhaps the controversy could be easily fixed by adding a line or two to Facebook's EULA.

Nevertheless, Chris Kelly, Facebook's chief privacy officer, didn't sound too concerned in his reply to Hansell's article. He said the ads are a "representation" of users' choosing to link themselves to a product, and that many states now see online consent as the same thing as written consent. After all, these are people choosing to publicly identify themselves with a brand.

Read the whole story at The New York Times »