Does Facebook Offer Privacy?

[M Paquette]

I have a close friend who owns a recruiting business that specializes in highly technical searches. She says that Facebook and Linked are now key tools for agencies and recruiters in the hiring process - to systematically eliminate older applicants without ever having to consider them just by first doing facebook and linked checks - thus avoiding age discrimination complaints. Showing friends, peers, personal networks & college associations is as good as posting your age. She now believes that recruiting companies are being selected based on their ability to use social networking tools in the recruiting process - "code talk" for age based filtering.

I've heard the same thing from a Human Resources VP. Lots of interesting code words for to indicate that 'over 40' need not apply, while dodging the EEO rules. She was telling me about common mistakes used to reject resumes, such as using actual years or dates for education and when positions were held that tip the reader to the applicant's probable age

 

[Sarah in SC]

That is really terrible to hear about the new and improved ways of discriminating against older workers. I wonder if there will ever be a shift to where older employees are considered more valuable?

 

[MichaelB]

That is really terrible to hear about the new and improved ways of discriminating against older workers. I wonder if there will ever be a shift to where older employees are considered more valuable?

This seems to be a US attitude, I only saw it in US companies in Latin America. Local companies usually had a better mix of ages, and I don't recall ever meeting a "young" exec of a local company. Even in family businesses there was lots of grey hair.

A very good friend went to work for a European company (after 20 years in US multinationals) and she said she if there was any evidence of age bias it favored the more experienced.

 

[HFWR]

That is really terrible to hear about the new and improved ways of discriminating against older workers. I wonder if there will ever be a shift to where older employees are considered more valuable?

We were supposed to die before we got old...

 

[Nords]

We were supposed to die before we got old...

Now we're all supposed to f-f-f-f-faaade away...

 

[easysurfer]

Okay...so being a member of Facebook (FB) since August. I like and dislike it.

I like that FB does allow me to keep up with what's going on quickly.

I dislike it in that if there is a way, it surely isn't apparent to separate some froms from all friends (which isn't like real life). In real life, in a room gathering for example, the folks at one corner might be talking about the kids soccer game while in the other corner some folks could be in conversation using some salty language, but out of earshot from everyone else. I don't see how that's done in FB. I can put friend in different groups (business, immediate family, kids, college buddies, etc.). But it seems like if I say, "friends only" able to see, then my kids friends can see my college buddies friends and vice versa.

 

[W2R]

That's a good point, easysurfer. Everyone you "friend" on Facebook is going to know everything about you, who your kids are, when you are on vacation and leaving your house empty, and so on, whether you know them well and trust them completely or not, and it's [-]hard [/-] impossible to separate your friends.

 

[easysurfer]

Would be nice if the groups worked like a distribution list on email. Remember those things? Only those on the distribution list can see the email. Would be nice if friend groupings in FB worked the same way. FB "Walls", but partitioned. That's an idea

 

[W2R]

Would be nice if the groups worked like a distribution list on email. Remember those things? Only those on the distribution list can see the email. Would be nice if friend groupings in FB worked the same way. FB "Walls", but partitioned. That's an idea

Yes, I do remember those distribution list emails! That's been a while.

My daughter used to blog about her daily activities and life on Livejournal, and she could create different groups of friends and she could limit those viewing a particular post, to those in just one of the groups, for example. That really worked nicely IMO. When she was angry with a co-worker, she could ensure that friends from work could not see that post. If she talked about racy things at all, then I couldn't see those posts either (so I don't know if she did). And so on.

That eliminated that problem. But you can't do that on Facebook as far as I know. I agree, that that is a big mistake on Facebook's part.

 

[easysurfer]

FB should have the privacy settings according to friend. For example for my niece with potty mouth...I would still keep her as a friend, but don't want everyone with sensative eyes to read her Wall. I don't see a way to do that though as my choice seems to be have all friends read friends' Walls or limit only me to read them and no one else. No in between.

It's like back in the mainframe computer days. I used to work with settings/permissions for IDs. They used to be at ID level, but switched it to group responsibility level. The latter might be easier to manage, but the detail and flexibility is lost.

 

[Sarah in SC]

Easysurfer, you can set your privacy settings to show some posts to some people and the like. I have my relatives segregated where they can only see some of my posts, albums, etc. I think the new Groups feature does this to an even greater degree than my friend categories do now.

W2R, you can do just as you described in FB, there is a little "lock" icon that you use to select who can read your posts.

 

[easysurfer]

Sarah,

I was just looking in Facebook. Do see the further customization, say if I post something, I select "make visible to ..." these people.... or "hide from.." these people. But..can I say "make visible to..." group #1 or "hide from .." group #2 etc? instead of listing out each friend in the group?

That still won't screen out my potty mouth niece and her Wall. What I'd want is, for example, allow her Wall to be visible to family, but friends who might blush..I wouldn't want them to see....

Or I may just have to tactful say to her when I see her next time.."DN (dear neice), I have this dilemma in Facebook..."

Thx,
Easysurfer

 

[Sarah in SC]

Yes--just set up your friends into groups--for instance, I have real life, relatives, music people, hoop people, once removed (friends of DH, who is not on FB), etc. People can be in more than one group. So I just start typing "real life" into the bar and those people are included or excluded from the post, album, what-have-you.
Holla at me via PM if you want me to step by step with you. I experiment with FB a lot.

 

[W2R]

This is interesting to know!! I didn't realize that could be done. Thanks, Sarah.

 

[easysurfer]

Interesting. I didn't know that either. The grouping does work like a distribution list grouping in outlook for emails then. So if I want to get the word out like a family reunion, just only show to family group..and there I go. Thanks Sarah.

 

[Sarah in SC]

Sarah, personal ambassador for Facebook. I just have a *lot* of time on my hands when I'm at w*rk to figure that kind of stuff out. And God knows I love a good time waster!

 

[ERD50]

My wife's facebook account just got hacked. A friend called, saying they got some IMs that she was in some foreign country and having problems. I know the next requests would be for money, it seemed like that would be a typical MO for a scam, and some googling confirmed it as a common scam. The scary thing is, some people have written back to her 'wall' (I don't do FB, so excuse if the terminology is wrong) expressing concern for her. So some people fall for this crap. And now, more people see this even if they didn't get the IM.

Anyhow, I had her log out and back in and change her password, and to post that the info they may have received is not true. I'm following up with the security info on the FaceBook site:

New Tools to Secure a Compromised Account | Facebook

But I think that basically comes down to "change your password"...

I'm going to have her change it again, her new PW pick is as weak as the old one ( a dictionary word and a number ). She says she has only logged on from her home computer and one other time on a relatives computer (that was using a cell phone type dongle for internet access). Both are Macs, so the odds of a keylogger on there seem remote. I bet it was just a brute force hack that cracked her simple password.

Not sure this warrants any other action... Opinions?

-ERD50

 

[easysurfer]

Sarah, personal ambassador for Facebook. I just have a *lot* of time on my hands when I'm at w*rk to figure that kind of stuff out. And God knows I love a good time waster!

Hi Sarah,

Okay...Here's another Facebook tip request . How can I make myself temporarily invisible on Facebook chat so my friends don't know I'm online at the moment? Like in YIM or AOL IM.

Sometimes I might want to go on Facebook but put us a 'do not disturb' so others can't see me.

 

[Nords]

Okay...Here's another Facebook tip request . How can I make myself temporarily invisible on Facebook chat so my friends don't know I'm online at the moment? Like in YIM or AOL IM.
Sometimes I might want to go on Facebook but put us a 'do not disturb' so others can't see me.

[Horschak]Oooh! Oooh! I use that one![/Horschak]

On the chat box in the lower RH portion of the screen, click on "Options" and then "Go Offline". Your chat box will change to "Chat (Offline)" and stay that way until you change it.

 

[easysurfer]

Thanks Nords. I see it now.

I'm rethinking some privacy things with FB. Mainly, my friend lists. When the list was just starting out, I allowed only friends to see them.

But now, I'm thinking I might need to fine tune that as even in friends, there are varying degrees....close friends, very close friends, etc.

 

[RonBoyd]

It's not a privacy 'breach' when information about you is out there already

Unfortunately, without an effective competitor for Facebook, your only viable protest against its defaults besides closing your account is to post misleading public information in your profile.

 

[zinger1457]

I don't have a FB account but recently received a FB invite from a new acquaintance. Included with the invite was a list of people I might know on FB, my sisters name was listed along with others I don't know. My sister and the new acquaintance live in different parts of the country and certainly don't know each other. Any ideas on how FB does this matching?

 

[Sarah in SC]

Thanks, Nords--especially for the Horschack visual. And I *stay* invisible on FB, because I can't stand that chat feature.
ERD, she should check on the applications she's using--those are a gaping hole just waiting for a hacker to get in. Limit very severely the ones used if at all possible.
I get those as well, Zinger. It isn't that your sister and the other person are related, it is just that you are on the email address book of each of them (that's the way most people start with FB). Not magic, just permissions granted when they signed up.

 

[Nords]

Thanks, Nords--especially for the Horschack visual. And I *stay* invisible on FB, because I can't stand that chat feature.

I use it with people who don't seem to communicate any other way, but they have to use one of those other ways to find me first.

One of those people was an old taekwondo instructor who'd moved away. One night my daughter brought me her laptop (logged into her FB account) and said "Here, he's done chatting with me and wants to chat with you." She was sorta torqued about it, but an hour's chat was apparently enough to satisfy him for a few months.

I'm not interested in getting up every morning for a FB chat. Heck, I do too much of it here already.

 

[easysurfer]

Okay...another FB privacy question. Not so much a "How to?" but more in theory.

Having the "Friends list" showing (even in my case, only "friends" can see my list) is like having your address book or roledex around in the open and anyone who I call a friend can peek though it at their convience.

It's that something you'd really want, or would you want to set some limits?