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the way we were
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg in Prep School
Where did Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg learn his imperious ways? Before he dropped out of Harvard, our social overlord was schooled in ruling others at Phillips Exeter Academy. Via a fellow Exonian, a leaked pic: More » -
crime
Prison Official Sacked Over Facebook Friends Behind Bars
Nathan Singh, a 27-year-old U.K. prison warden, has been fired for making friends with 13 criminals on Facebook. Singh was suspected of smuggling cell phones to his Facebook pals. More » -
meltdowns
Nouriel Roubini Copters His Way Back Home
Who's the most popular guy in the midst of the worst economic crisis in decades? Why, none other than Nouriel Roubini, New York University's own Dr. Doom. He just got back from a world tour. More » -
twitter
Mark Zuckerberg Outs Himself on Twitter
Facebook almost bought Twitter for $500 million last year. The deal didn't happen — but the service found a fan in 24-year-old Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. This morning, he revealed himself as "finkd" on Twitter. More » -
great moments in pr
How Mark Zuckerberg TOSsed Facebook Under the Bus
Only lawyers and nerds get excited about debating a website's terms of service. And yet Facebook managed to turn a change in its legalese into a PR nightmare. Here's an anatomy of the debacle. More » -
blagosphere
Rod Blagojevich Signs Another Document
The question isn't why crazy-corrupt Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was impeached; it's why it took so long. It turns out the guy has a popular touch! A very popular one. And an update! More » -
Shana Madoff
Hedge-fund fraudster's niece disappears from Facebook
In trouble with the law? First, get a lawyer. Second, delete your Facebook page. Shana Madoff Swanson, couture-loving niece of accused Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff, has followed that script. -
your privacy is an illusion
A Facebook cheat sheet for Obama's team
The New York Observer pulled together a crib sheet of Facebook facts from the personal pages of chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and others likely to end up on Obama's team. It's a bit snoozy, since no one admits anything shocking. Current Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who may be reappointed, lists his interests as "espionage, defense policy, national security and Soviet studies." The only surprise on the list is John Kerry, who claims Animal House as a favorite movie. -
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your privacy is an illusion
Virgin Atlantic fires 13 over Facebook posts
After flight attendants called passengers "chavs" — British slang for rude louts — and criticized the airline's safety practices on Facebook, Virgin Atlantic fired 13 of them. See? Facebook layoffs! [BBC News] -
caption contest
Elevation's new partners
Even Bono's privacy is an illusion. A picture of the U2 rocker (and venture-capital investor at Silicon Valley's Elevation Partners) with two comely teenagers, Hannah Emerson and Andrea Feick, was leaked to the Daily Mail via Facebook. (The site has notoriously bad security on its online photo albums. Know someone who knows someone who knows someone? You can see their pics, no problem.) We now understand why Wikipedia cofounder Jimmy Wales likes to pal around with Bono; great minds think below the belt. Can you think of a better caption? Leave it in the comments. The best one will become the post's new headline. Friday's winner: kgbeat, who turned Jason Calacanis's two-fingered salute into the answer to the question, "How many rounds of layoffs are planned at Mahalo?" -
your privacy is an illusion
National Security Agency spends $2 million on Google
Why did the citizen-spying National Security Agency pay Google $2 million? According to a contractobtained through the Freedom of Information Act and parsed by Blogoscoped, the NSA purchased "four Google search appliances, two-years replacement warranty on all of them, and 100 hours of consulting support." I know, kind of a letdown. But we sincerely hope that won't stop the conspiracy theorists from creating another paranoia-fueled video like the classic we've embedded below. More » -
divya narendra
Guy who sued Facebook joins Facebook
Harvard alum Divya Narendra is on Facebook, one of his classmates noticed today. The social network started at that Ivy League school, so his joining it wouldn't be notable — except Narendra started ConnectU, the social network from which Narendra and his cofounders say fellow Harvard man Mark Zuckerberg stole the idea for Facebook. The other two founders are Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, who rowed in the Beijing Olympics and are also very tall. Narendra didn't take advantage of Facebook's excellent privacy features and has his profile exposed to the entire New York network. Narendra has been less vocal than the Winklevosses about ConnectU's continuing fight with Facebook, but according to his Facebook wall, which we've pasted below, Narendra's friends still can't believe he joined the site. Also below: Guess which company Narendra did not include in the "Education and Work" section of his profile: -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook mining your Wall posts for more marketing data
Popular socialnetworkutility Facebook has updated Lexicon, the tool for marketers and advertisers to monitor what users are saying about topics or products. It now scans the publicly available updates made by users, such as posts to each other's "Walls," and now the new Sentiment feature produces visual displays of related terms — the better to position your brand and spin discontent by buying ads targeted to the very keywords Facebook users are typing into their profiles. More » -
your privacy is an illusion
France's "electronic Bastille" sounds a lot like Facebook
The French government plans to create a database called Edvige that will log information about anyone in the country over the age of 13, including whether or not they are "likely to breach public order." The idea is to help crack down on crime, an issue President Nicholas Sarkozy successfully campaigned on. Other information that would be included? More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Virus mimics Facebook's hated Beacon ads
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg should be relieved to learn that someone is at last "leveraging the social graph," as he might put it, for financial gain. Problem is, it's not Facebook. It's hackers pulling a phishing scam. A tipster tells us his friends at Facebook are busy fighting a virus that tricks a user into opening "a YouTube phishing site," delivered in the form of a Facebook message from one of the user's Facebook friends. More » -
security
Facebook security spends all night battling worms
Facebook is under an attack of the worms similar to the MyDoom worm, rendered into an image above, that became the fastest spreading email worm ever in 2004. In recent days, thousands of users have fallen prey to at least two strains of malicious code that once downloaded onto a users computer, steal that user's Facebook username and password in order to spread itself via false links posted to friends' messages boards. Facebook security chief Max Kelly writes on the company blog that after a night of work, his team "identified and blocked the ability to link to the malicious websites from anywhere on Facebook." Security firm Sophos, which of course makes a living scaring people, says the threat isn't over. "If workers are allowed to be given access to these sites," goes Sophos "analyst" Graham Cluley's pitch,"then it's vital that they do not put their personal and corporate data at risk, and are protected from web-based infections." -
your privacy is an illusion
Fake-gay Facebook profile lands Brit $43,000 in damages
Matthew Firsht, managing director of Applause Store Productions, which finds audiences for television and radio shows, won the equivalent of $33,000 in damages against a former schoolfriend. Grant Raphael's profile for Firsht falsely suggested was looking for same-sex relationships and was signed up with groups including Gay in the Wood…Borehamwood and Gay Jews in London. The judge awarded Firsht $29,500 for libel and $4,000 for breach of privacy. Firsht's firm was awarded $10,000 for libel. [Guardian] -
your privacy is an illusion
Depraved pictures land Facebook user two-year jail sentence
If you can't do the time, don't post photos on Facebook celebrating the crime. That's the harsh lesson 20-year-old college student Joshua Lipton learned after a judge handed him a two-year sentence for severely injuring a woman while driving drunk. Photographs on Facebook of Lipton partying in an orange jumpsuit labeled "Jail Bird" proved he was without remorse, a prosecutor argued, and the judge agreed, calling them depraved. Lipton's attorney, Kevin Bristow, argued that the photos showed Lipton's confusion after the accident and noted that he'd written apologetic letters to the crash victim and her family. Right. What we suspect really confused Lipton: The idea that anyone over the age of 21 might actually know how to use Facebook. -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook redesign exposed birth dates
Here's a good way for Facebook to keep its demographic young: IT security firm Sophos reports that early on during Facebook's beta test of a new user-profile design, the site revealed its members birth dates, even if members had set that information to private. That'll keep the Olds who turn 43 every year off the site. Facebook needs to be very careful when it comes to privacy — the site would like to figure out a way to target ads based on user's personal data, and wants to make sure users are comfortable inputting accurate information. And Facebook is being hypocritical: When Slide's Facebook Top Friends app revealed users' birth dates, Facebook temporarily kicked the app off the website. Of course, we won't hold our breath waiting for Facebook to suspend its entire website. But maybe it could back down from its holier-than-thou pose that the platform is a level playing field and Facebook is just another player? Yes, please. -
facebook
Add the wrong Facebook widget and your face could appear in ads all over
Ad network for widgetmakers SocialMedia plans to serve ads in Facebook widgets and possibly across the Internet that use pictures of the ad-viewers' Facebook friends. Called "social banners," the service can only display a Facebook user's picture if that user already added a widget made by one of SocialMedia's partners, thereby agreeing to share such personal information. But after adding the widget, the "social banners" service is opt-out only — much like Facebook Beacon, the controversial ad program Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg called a "mistake" at the AllThingsD conference. The news has Facebook-watcher and SocialTimes blogger Nick O'Neil freaked out. "There are a number of issues at hand and many of them are extremely complex," O'Neill writes. We're not that worried. Facebook users should know that adding a third-party application means you're willing to share your personal information with that third-party. A commenter on O'Neill's post puts its simpler: "If you don’t like it just change settings to block 3rd party cookies. 10 seconds, privacy issues solved." -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook profiles for sale on eBay
An eBay seller going by the handle pseudopr415 is offering 10 Facebook profiles, each with a minimum of 200 friends, for sale in an eBay auction that closes June 14. The seller writes: "I currently am testing the waters, and would like to see if any marketers are interested in using these." Facebook makes a lot of noise about how its users trust the site so much, they'll often supply their cell phone numbers, email and home addresses for their friends and contacts to see. Access to that information could be worth plenty to spammers as well as identity thieves. The product description pseudopr415 created — including a five-step fake profile plan, descriptions of the characters he's created for the 10 profiles and, in case you have any questions, an email to contact the sneaky bastard — below: More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook's widget security? You could throw a sheep through it
Linking up social websites, as proponents of "data portability" would have us do, can be hazardous to your privacy. And Paris Hilton's, and Lindsay Lohan's. But even the widgets on a single social network can leave us exposed. SuperPoke, a popular application made by Slide, will show you who's thrown a sheep at anyone, as long as you have their Facebook ID — the unique numeric identifier which shows up in the URL of their Facebook profile. Mark Zuckerberg's SuperPoke feed is here; substitute the number of another Facebook user for Zuckerberg's "4", and you can see every last sheep he or she has been involved with. More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan private pics exposed by Yahoo hack
Want to see Paris Hilton's MySpace profile? How about Lindsay Lohan's? Don't worry about those pesky privacy settings. Thanks to "data portability," a faddish technology movement that the Valley has been buzzing about for months, you can see any profile you want on MySpace. Byron Ng, a Canadian computer technician with a knack for finding Web security holes, has discovered that Yahoo's integration with MySpace makes it easy to view photos for any profile. These images, which Ng obtained from Hilton's and Lohan's profiles, speak to the danger Yahoo and MySpace's lax data-sharing habits pose: More » -
lawsuits
Judge forces Facebook to out fake profile creators
The person who created a fake Facebook profile for Dean Tim Puntarelli of Roncalli High School in Indianapolis likely felt comfortably shrouded in Facebook's seeming anonymity as he sent "inappropriate" pictures from the account to students. No longer. A local judge ordered Facebook to reveal the prankster's IP address to Puntarelli; the Archdiocese of Indianapolis which runs the school calls it "identity theft." (Photo of a priest with a cane by Paweł Kabański) -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook making sure there's nowhere on the Web to hide
Facebook's formal announcement of Facebook Connect is at once a transparently timed response to MySpace's announcement of partnerships with eBay and Twitter yesterday and the culmination of things the social network has been working on for ages. Facebook Connect, at its simplest, lets websites like Digg and Twitter integrate their users' activity into Facebook users' News Feeds. Those two companies, as well as Yahoo's Flickr and Google's Picasa, have been using Facebook Connect well before it was unveiled under that name. It cements Facebook's role as a central place to keep up with one's friends. Yet I'm not sure how I feel about it. More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook posts more driver's licenses from advertisers
The employee at Ping Pong Music who had his drivers' license inadvertently published by Facebook for all the world to see tells us he's discovered at least two more licenses exposed by the site. He found one on the Facebook page for music group Switchfoot and the other on the page for Ben Kweller. Facebook allows musicians and their labels to promote music through official Musician Pages, but before allowing them to upload music, Facebook requires the page administrators to submit identification in case of copyright .The Ping Pong Music employee tells us he's tried to contact Facebook about the problem — sending four emails and calling four times — but all he's gotten in response so far is the following brushoff via email: More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook posts advertiser's driver's license for all the world to see
Musicians can promote their work through Facebook's Musician Pages. But before allowing them to upload music files, Facebook requires administrators to submit scans of their driver's licenses, to keep on file in case claims of copyright infringement come up. Last night, one of these administrators, an employee at Ping Pong Music, discovered Facebook had posted his license publicly on EMI artist This World Fair's page. He took a screenshot, which we've included below. More » -
your privacy is an illusion
The BBC creates a Facebook app to steal identities
In order to demonstrate how easy it would be for an malicious developer to create an application that steals private information from Facebook users, BBC television series Click created such an application themselves. Then they set up some spooky lighting and filmed a dude using two computers. "ID theft is a serious matter," the narrator intones. Check it out in the clip. -
social networks
Egyptian girl disappears for 16 days after creating Facebook group
Eygptian woman Esraa Abdel-Fattah created the Facebook group "6 April: A Nationwide Strike." On April 7, she disappeared for 16 days. After her mother bought an ad in the newspaper Al-Masry Al-Yom pleading for her daughter's release, the government finally obliged. But Abdel-Fattah learned her lesson. "I have not heard about any coming strike nor do I want to hear about it," she told Al-Ahram, a weekly paper. Her uncle, the weekly also reports, said Abdel-Fattah agreed to get rid of her computer. The Egyptian government is now said to be deciding between blocking Facebook entirely or continuing to use it to spy on its citizens. -
your privacy is an illusion
Israeli military imprisons soldier who posted photos to Facebook
A soldier from an elite unit of the Israel Defense Force will be spending 19 days behind bars after posting photos of his base to Facebook, reports Ha'aretz. Those photos have presumably been taken down. But I turned up dozens of photos posted by soldiers in the IDF goofing off with their units, brandishing weapons and, in the case of the photo above, standing next to a multimillion-dollar American jet fighter — even though the Israel Air Force specifically ordered its members to remove any photos posted to the site. It looks like Facebook's problems with privacy aren't limited to accidentally letting your boss see you taking hits off a bong, but could potentially lead to military intelligence leaks as well. -
your privacy is an illusion
Online-ad lobbyist calls New York privacy bill "unconstitutional," by which he means "unprofitable"
New York State Assemblyman Richard Brodsky wants to fine online advertisers for using consumers' private information without their consent. Jim Halpert, top flack for a coalition formed by Google, AOL, Yahoo, Facebook and others said such a law "is unnecessary, most likely unconstitutional, and would have profound implications for the future of Internet advertising and the availability of free content on the Internet." Unimpressed, Brodsky told the Wall Street Journal, "These guys want the unadulterated right to invade the privacy of the citizens of this state and we're not going to let them do that," he said. "This is why we have governments, not just corporations." That's right — god forbid anyone privatize the government's vital job of invading your privacy -
your privacy is an illusion
Breaking up is hard to do on Facebook
A distraught reader wrote in last night with a tale of woe. He'd just broken up with his girlfriend. "We had a conversation where I told her I would not announce it and just tell if people ask," he said. Still, we all have needs, and in a moment of weakness he changed his relationship status on Facebook to "single," and then clicked the button to delete the status change in his mini-feed. The dialog box promised "Hiding will remove the story from your Mini-Feed and prevent anyone from seeing it." More » -
poll
Help Zuckerberg pick a new profile picture
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hasn't updated his profile picture in quite some time. Hey, he's been busy. Let's help him by choosing a new one. Since Facebook's privacy is so flimsy, we have plenty of options from photos Zuckerberg has already uploaded. To follow our advice, Mark, all you have to do is click on "Make Profile Picture." More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook security lapse exposes Mark Zuckerberg's private Facebook photos
Canadian Byron Ng found a way around Facebook privacy safeguards and forwarded pictures of Paris Hilton's brother drinking beer to the Associated Press. How'd he do it? As we reported in January, Facebook doesn't provide much security for its users' photos. With the right URL, anyone can see any photo, whether its marked private or not. Take, for example, the photos from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's own private album, embedded below. In it, Zuck shows that he drinks beer and even sometimes wears a tux. More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Facebook confirms Facebook Chat, makes life easier for stalkers
Facebook will launch Facebook Chat, a Web-based IM system built into Facebook, in the coming weeks, flack Meredith Chin confirmed today. There go startup Social.im's hopes for an acquisition. Chin wouldn't share any more details. (You should. Leaks are good for business, remember.) She also said Facebook would introduce new privacy updates tomorrow, including an option to allow "friends of friends" to share information. I'll start. 25/m/NY. -
your privacy is an illusion
How Jimmy Wales's Facebook profile gets him laid
On Facebook, Jimmy Wales has just one question for you: Are you interested? If you're cute and female, he is. We're told Wales will friend just about anyone who fits that description. Since his breakup with Canadian journalist Rachel Marsden became public, he's sanitized his Facebook profile, dropping most of the racy apps. Even so, his profile still shows evidence of a promiscuous approach to adding people. Here's a screenshot: More » -
your privacy is an illusion
Your Facebook profile could show up in a tax audit
Dutch technology entrepreneur Evert Bopp had the pleasure of meeting with Irish tax inspectors last Tuesday. Things got really fun when one of them pulled out printed copies of Bopp's Facebook, Xing and LinkedIn profiles. "I was surprised," Bopp said. He shouldn't have been. A flack for the Revenue service told the Irish Independent auditors are free to use "any sources of information." You think the IRS policy is any different? It's one thing to get busted by the boss, quite another to get busted by the feds. (Photo by chadmill) -
laurene powell-jobs
Mrs. Steve Jobs vanishes from Facebook
Steve Jobs isn't on Facebook. Now his wife has disappeared from the site. A few days ago, we posted about Laurene Powell-Jobs's Facebook page, and her curious membership in the Apple network, normally restricted to employees. Today, it has disappeared from view entirely. It's not visible to anyone searching for her name or from within the Apple network, to which she belongs. More » -
the chart
Remember when Zuckerberg stole Christmas? Users don't
Here's a chart which records traffic to Facebook's privacy-settings page. What does that indicate? It shows just how little Facebook users seemed to notice the whole Beacon controversy. AllFacebook, which put together the chart using Compete.com, says the chart is evidence that users need better privacy education. We say users are just ready for a brave new world. -
your privacy is an illusion
Steve Jobs isn't in Apple's Facebook network — but his wife is
Laurene Powell-Jobs, Steve Jobs's wife, is in the Apple network on Facebook. Isn't that for Apple employees only? To join an employer's Facebook network, users must have an approved email address. Only those whose addresses ends in @apple.com can join the Apple network. As far as we can determine, Powell-Jobs does not hold a position at Apple. If she did, Apple would certainly have to disclose it in SEC filings. So what is she doing in the Apple Facebook group? Her full Facebook profile is below. More »





























