It's been less than a year since I signed up on Facebook. After signing up and getting into it, I found many people whom I couldn't locate before FB. I've also had a few find me that I didn't care to communicate again.
After signing up, I went straight to my account settings and turned off ALL notifications so I wouldn't get a thousand emails in my inbox informing me of everything that happened on FB. I set my privacy settings to include only my friends, and I opted out of everything I could find. Each time FB makes another "improvement" I have to go back in and uncheck whatever they enabled WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!
I'm not a total privacy fanatic or anything, but they do that to a lot of people who have no idea how to turn it on/off. The facial recognition database is just taking things too far. I'll explain why in a minute. Tagging photos of other people without their consent should not be allowed either. I've done it without thinking of any consequences to my friends...one of the only arguments I ever had with my best friend.
Here's a scenario that could actually happen:
A creepy person takes a picture that includes you at a bar. It's not just a picture of you, so you don't think any more about it. That person goes home and uploads the picture to Facebook. When it asks him to tag the people, it gives suggestions...and based on pictures of yourself in their database, it gives your name. Every bit of info you've posted without setting privacy settings to "Friends Only" is available to the creep! Where you live, email address, websites...everything. This is a stalkers dream come true! The same is true of businesses and government officials. Have you ever had a friend who became an enemy?
Facebook is a privacy nightmare. We need an alternative, preferably open source. Freely available and controlled by the masses, not some jerk who is on a grab for power and money.
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