Frustrated with Facebook’s privacy debacle? lifeID offers a simple solution: You control your identity; you control who sees your data and personal info.
Facebook cannot change, building a better way is up to us.
Facebook’s latest scandal has once again dragged the social media giant’s shabby data-sharing policies into the national spotlight.
This latest episode is just that — the latest episode. Last year, it was revealed Facebook was tied the Russian misinformation campaign that played out during the 2016 presidential election. Prior to that, Facebook — and its shady data sharing policies — have been at the center of scandals reaching back to at least 2007. Now, it has been discovered the social media sold personal data to Cambridge Analytica for irresponsible — and possibly criminal — purposes.
Faced with public outcry and plummeting stock prices, Facebook is now in full-blown damage control mode. Initially, the company’s response was anemic and tone deaf: It turned to Twitter, offering a semantic distinction. “There was no breach,” it reminded users, which appears true enough. Since then, Facebook announced heightened “privacy controls”, which it began rolling out this week.
But as any boxer will tell you: Defensive moves are worthless if they leave the fighter vulnerable to counterpunches. And Facebook’s weak defensive strategies are only calling attention to the tech giant’s many data missteps.
Indeed, Facebook was not “breached,” but what transpired was far worse. Just to recap: Cambridge Analytica built an app, which Facebook allowed onto its platform in 2014. The app enabled Cambridge to scrape personal data from 50 million Facebook users without their knowledge. Worse still: the app scraped data from the friends of the app users — people who neither downloaded the app nor clicked “approve” on any user agreements.
This revelation alone is forcing many of Facebook’s 2 billion users to ask if they even want to be associated with a social media heavyweight that allows third parties to enter a seemingly secure platform and mine unauthorized data. Billions of people now recognize the company they trusted to manage their family photos and private messages intentionally sold Cambridge Analytica personal data because that is part of the Facebook business model.
Latest Facebook privacy debacle triggers familiar reaction
Facebook is now hunkered down in an unfortunately familiar, DefCon 4 crisis-management mode where founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is making the rounds offering a multitude of mea culpas and has agreed to testify before lawmakers to provide an accounting of what went wrong.
Step one in the damage-control playbook is Zuckerberg assuring the public, stockholders and legislators that his company “cares”. Facebook is sorry and it intends to do better.
As sincere as his response may sound, I would like to point out Zuckerberg has covered similar ground in the past. In fact, he penned a 2010 editorial in the Washington Post that included his list of promises to Facebook users:
“Here are the principles,” he wrote, “under which Facebook operates”:.
— You have control over how your information is shared.
— We do not share your personal information with people or services you. don’t want.
— We do not give advertisers access to your personal information.
— We do not and never will sell any of your information to anyone.
— We will always keep Facebook a free service for everyone.”
Reading this eight years later would funny, if it were not so appalling. Mark Zuckerberg is the founder of Facebook and remains its CEO. This lofty position has earned him an estimated $64 billion. He has helmed the company since its inception, changed Facebook’s policies and broke his promises. No one forced his hand. Now he asks billions of users around the globe to believe that he is sincere this time.
The truth is this: Facebook will not, and in fact, cannot improve. Despite the many mea culpas, Zuckerberg does not mind the cycle of outrage and apology because we, consumers, are not Facebook’s customers; we are its products. Facebook has created a staggeringly profitable business, generating over $1.5 million in revenue per employee selling access to us, our data, our likes and dislikes, our politics and wealth of other personal information.
Facebook’s actual customers are those businesses and corporations that pay to gain access to the mountain of private information Facebook has accumulated. Businesses such as Cambridge Analytica dictate Facebook’s actions, not those who use the site to stay in touch with family and friends.
We have no control over how our personal information is shared. Facebook constantly shares our information with people and services unbeknownst to us. How the information is used is a mystery, but we do know that bad actors have used our data to lie, distort and destroy to further their own agendas.
The only way for Facebook to fix the problem is to stop aggregating our data and selling it. They can’t. It’s like asking Ford to stop manufacturing automobiles.
Like many tech giants, Facebook is, at its core, an advertising company. It cannot change because shareholders, corporate boards, stock analysts and many others are counting on Facebook’s business models to thrive. As a result, Facebook and other information powerhouses must adhere to their existing business models they have so efficiently dispatched. They are unable to adapt or change.
A self-sovereign identity blockchain platform is the answer
Rather than expecting big data houses like Facebook to change, consumers must instead demand and create an identity that is impervious to the demands of social media giants — one that leaves consumers in charge of their own data and their identities.
At lifeID we are creating a world where such a data model will flourish: an open-source, decentralized, blockchain-based digital identity that each individual controls. Blockchain technology has earned its share of hype and has been the target of some skepticism, (some of it deserved). But don’t let the hype distract you from the fact that blockchain gives us the tools needed to facilitate human trust. It is this promise of that trust and the newer, better business model that trust can enable that explains why there is so much excitement now surrounding blockchain technology.
In a world equipped with lifeID, anytime you need to share information about yourself, you will be the one authorizing a fast, secure transmission of you personal information, but you will reveal only the information needed — and you will determine who will see it — not a multi-billion dollar corporation.
Read lifeID’s Bill of Rights. It offers our commitment to consumers, ensure they and they alone will manage their identities and credentials.
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