Facebook's 'Like This' Button Is Tracking You

Stoobalou submitted a story about some of the most obvious research I've seen in a while ... "A researcher from a Dutch university is warning that Facebook's 'Like This' button is watching your every move. Arnold Roosendaal, who is a doctoral candidate at the Tilburg University for Law, Technology and Society, warns that Facebook is tracking and tracing everyone, whether they use the social networking site or not. Roosendaal says that Facebook's tentacles reach way beyond the confines of its own web sites and subscriber base because more and more third party sites are using the 'Like This' button and Facebook Connect."

Comments

No surprises here

[korkwin]

This is nothing new. We've all known this.

Re:No surprises here

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. I've been aware of this long before Facebook even added that feature. After all, this is the reason that most email programs/sites don't display images by default because spammers use it to verify/track email addresses.

The stupid thing is that the websites just give Facebook the free space without getting anything in return. FaceBook has a free ad on every single page that sites display the Like button on, and all the site gets is the chance that the user will add it to their list of liked things, and maybe--if the stars align--their addition will be reflected in someone else's feed and make it go viral.

I'm tired of Facebook, but there really is no good alternative.

Re:No surprises here

[sarysa]

Some people seem to have the delusion that companies actually care about who you are and why you're clicking this and that, but they only care about your statistics. They want to know that single white 27 year old female likes Lady GaGa, not that Janet Doe likes Lady GaGa...

Re:No surprises here

[Anonymous Coward]

Why on EARTH do people run their scripts, anyway?

Because the out-of-the-box default behavior for every popular browser is to download everything referenced, pass whatever cookie it happens to have whenever it does that, execute every such downloaded script, and so on.

Facebook isn't really the problem here. Our browsers are.

Naw, really?

[drunkennewfiemidget]

I'm not a doctoral candidate, and I could have told you that.

Facebook's primary objective is data collection and selling it to marketers. It's kind of what they do.

ABP

[scheveningen]

And that is why we like Add Block Plus. Not only does it protect some of your privacy, it also speeds up your page loading.

Speak for yourself

[betterunixthanunix]

You have a website that has pictures of you, your current whereabouts, mood, who you like, where you live, work, sleep, and every interaction with anyone else has just as much information pulled out and sorted. And you're bothered by the Like this button?!

You seem to be a Facebook user; I am not. If Facebook is tracking me anyway, then yes, I am bothered.

Re:Speak for yourself

[vux984]

If you are in the habit of accepting and keeping every cookie ever offered to you, you were being "tracked" before Facebook got involved.

For my part I *really* don't care if the website I'm visiting is tracking my movements on its own site.

I -only- get irate when that tracking starts to follow me around after I leave.

I don't use facebook, and that near ubiquitous facbook icon on pages used to merely annoy me for being a waste of space and an eyesore. But I wasn't specifcially aware that it was actively tracking me if I ignored it. Perhaps if I had thought about it, I'd have realized that it was likely wired back to facebook and tracking me, but until now I hadn't.

So I do find this interesting. Not that I needed another reason to despise facebook.

And yes, other widespread tracking systems also do bother me; I've regularly criticized google's reach between its advertising and analytics numerous times here on slashdot.