Facebook has always been the source of hottest discussion and gossip about its security and privacy with a lot of people criticizing its privacy policies and some applauding them. But time and again, incidents have occurred which have exposed Facebook privacy flaws and bought the debate into limelight. It is natural that any site with such a huge number of users is bound to be discussed and evaluated at regular intervals. This is why the privacy settings of Facebook are always under the scanner and always changing from time to time. This is because the endeavour of people at Facebook to give users more control over their profiles and to protect them from intrusions into their privacy. Yet this has not been enough and breaches and flaws emerged many times in the recent past. In fact, last year, the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg also faced such problems when his private pictures became public because of a privacy flaw and exposed his private life to the world.
Facebook Privacy Flaw exposed two College Gay Students Accidentally
Another incident which occurred recently was much more serious when a facebook privacy flaw exposed two gay students accidently. This incident was reported from the University of Texas where two students Taylor McCormik and Bobbi Duncan were exposed because a flaw in the privacy settings of facebook. The incident happened because one of the friends of the two students added them to a Choir group consisting of Gay students and this action caused their inclusion into the choir to be broadcasted on other student’s news feeds and this exposed their identities which they had kept carefully guarded till now. This has caused extreme anxiety to the two students and their respective families who are believed to be conservative in their outlook. This recent happening has further raised doubts and questions about the maintenance of privacy on Facebook. The basic problem is that anybody in your friend list can invite you and add you to a group without your permission but this is not the actual cause of the whole incident. The incident resulted because the friend who invited the two students had turned the group settings to “open” which results in the sharing of the news of their inclusion into the choir with other students. Apparently the student who added them thought that since his family was comfortable with his lifestyle choice, the families of other students are also comfortable with their homosexuality. Bobbi Duncan wanted badly to keep her lesbian status a secret from her father but Facebook exposed her right away and similar is the case for Taylor McCormik who is a gay student whose belongs to a highly conservative. Although they might have wanted to come out to the world, but they would never have thought that it would be like this as facebook has left them with no other alternative. Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes has offered apologies on behalf of Facebook and promised of a better privacy environment but irreparable damage has been done to the lives of the two students and it is going to take a while for them to cope with this situation and a long time for things to turn to normal.
