A US appeals court has dismissed federal wiretap claims against Facebook and Zynga in a civil lawsuit over disclosure of user information to advertisers.
In a separate ruling, the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals also revived breach of contract claims under state law against Facebook over the information disclosures.
These were the days when everyone was still beautiful, and we were all still rich. The things big bubble-pop doomsayers kept predicting hadn’t happened yet, and Facebook was on top of everything else. It was just firing. And firing. And firing. Even the misses–Paper and Home and Poke–seemed like they didn’t matter because its hits were so vital. And with the wind at its back, the fog of war blew away from its eyes and into those of its enemies. It seemed like only Mark could see clearly.
Facebook has spent a lot of time recently talking about anything but Facebook. Instead, the company has spent billions buying technology and developing new apps separate from the Facebook service. But on Thursday, the social network announced the first significant feature for its core product in over a year.
Called Nearby Friends, it lets users see which of their Facebook friends are in physical proximity to them.
Despite pressure from the Federal Trade Commission, Facebook is unlikely to leave WhatsApp's stricter privacy policies intact, once government regulators approve the $19 billion acquisition, privacy experts say.
Late last week, Jessica Rich, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, sent Facebook a letter, warning the social network that it must abide by the privacy promises WhatsApp made to users of its instant messaging service.
Facebook has never seemed to have a particularly friendly relationship with security and privacy. After all, the more Facebook knows about you, the more the company can profit from the social graph. But while the company has implemented some fine security features for users, the way they present them leaves a lot to be desired.
Russia and Brazil are hacking Facebook, and the social network is paying them to do it.
Facebook paid out US$1.5 million to security researchers worldwide last year as part of its Bug Bounty programme, and the two emerging markets were responsible for reporting some of the most critical threats, according to a report Facebook released this week.
Earlier today, Dustin Curtis wrote a post about the recent Facebook desktop redesign.
Dustin makes a few assumptions about the rationale behind the redesign, including how some of the beauty and cleanliness of the initial version tested a year ago was discarded for the sake of short-term metrics. I thought it’d be helpful to shed some light on the real reasons why the design has evolved. The goal of making News Feed all about the content—with bigger photos and more expressive stories—is near and dear to my heart. It’s why we started the project in the first place.
Facebook revealed Thursday it has a lab working on using drones, satellites and solar-powered planes to provide web access around the world.
"We've been working on ways to beam Internet to people from the sky," Facebook co-founder and chief Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on the leading social network.
While other Silicon Valley companies were allegedly colluding to prevent recruiting of each other's employees, Facebook refused Google's request to participate, according to a recent court filing.
Facebook has built its business upon the sharing of content between people worldwide, but protecting that data is a gargantuan responsibility -- one that demands an increasing amount of transparency.
