Is privacy an ethical issue too?

Internet Giants Facebook and Google are both called out on privacy concerns



Yesterday, I happened to stumble upon two news articles regarding privacy and multi-million/billion dollar empires.

Apparently, both Google and Facebook (quite possibly the rulers of the world wide web) have broken federal law with their respective creative ventures.

Google’s popular “Street View” feature that was introduced to Google Maps 3 years ago has seemingly collected highly sensitive and personal information of Canadian citizens’ (such as email addresses, usernames, passwords) using their Camera Car specially equipped with a code that could detect unsecured wireless networks and information shared over those networks.

Privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart stated in a news release,
“The impact of new and rapidly evolving technologies on modern life is undeniably exciting. However, the consequences for people can be grave if the potential privacy implications aren’t properly considered at the development stage of these new technologies.”



Conversely, Facebook is being pressured by members of the U.S. Congress to tighten its privacy agreement with its app and game partners (such as Farmville and Texas HoldEm Poker) after the Wall Street Journal revealed its investigation findings on Monday. It was discovered that these app partners were obtaining Facebook users “Facebook IDs”, which linked to not only an affected individual’s Facebook page, but to their friends’ as well.

One Twitter user commented:
“It bothers me that if my FB friends play w/ Apps MY privacy is affected. I’m penalized for having stupid friends.”

So how is privacy an ethical issue?

To be continued…

Two of the apps that are breaching Facebook's privacy policies...