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Only 22% of Americans Now Trust Facebook's Handling of Personal Info (fortune.com)
An anonymous reader quotes Fortune:
Facebook is the least trustworthy of all major tech companies when it comes to safeguarding user data, according to a new national poll conducted for Fortune, highlighting the major challenges the company faces following a series of recent privacy blunders. Only 22% of Americans said that they trust Facebook with their personal information, far less than Amazon (49%), Google (41%), Microsoft (40%), and Apple (39%)....
In question after question, respondents ranked the company last in terms of leadership, ethics, trust, and image... Public mistrust extended to Zuckerberg, Facebook's public face during its privacy crisis and who once said that Facebook has "a responsibility to protect your information, If we can't, we don't deserve it." The company subsequently fell victim to a hack but continued operating as usual, including debuting a video-conferencing device intended to be used in people's living rooms or kitchens and that further extends Facebook's reach into more areas outside of personal computers and smartphones. Only 59% of respondents said they were "at least somewhat confident" in Zuckerberg's leadership in the ethical use of data and privacy information, ranking him last among four other tech CEOS...
As for Facebook, the social networking giant may have a difficult time regaining public trust because of its repeated problems. Consumers are more likely to forgive a company if they believe a problem was an aberration rather than a systemic failure by its leadership, Harris Poll CEO John Gerzema said.
The article concludes that "For now, the public isn't in a forgiving mood when it comes to Facebook and Zuckerberg."
In question after question, respondents ranked the company last in terms of leadership, ethics, trust, and image... Public mistrust extended to Zuckerberg, Facebook's public face during its privacy crisis and who once said that Facebook has "a responsibility to protect your information, If we can't, we don't deserve it." The company subsequently fell victim to a hack but continued operating as usual, including debuting a video-conferencing device intended to be used in people's living rooms or kitchens and that further extends Facebook's reach into more areas outside of personal computers and smartphones. Only 59% of respondents said they were "at least somewhat confident" in Zuckerberg's leadership in the ethical use of data and privacy information, ranking him last among four other tech CEOS...
As for Facebook, the social networking giant may have a difficult time regaining public trust because of its repeated problems. Consumers are more likely to forgive a company if they believe a problem was an aberration rather than a systemic failure by its leadership, Harris Poll CEO John Gerzema said.
The article concludes that "For now, the public isn't in a forgiving mood when it comes to Facebook and Zuckerberg."
I think the crazy thing here is that 22% of Americans still trust Facebook with their private data. That number is astonishingly high.
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The vast majority of people don't give two shits about privacy.
If they did, Facebook wouldn't have hundreds of millions of users.
The true headline here is "Facebook is run by evil scumbags and most people are just fine with that."
I think you have to go one step further. It's not just indifference but ignorance of what is at stake or the value of their personal information. I regularly support a large number of 'elderly' folks who use Facebook and email in general and they have no concept of information privacy or the potential impact. Only after it is explained to them in a manner they can understand do they begin to grasp the significance and the value of their privacy and the impact of their personal information being gathered and used against them. Most of the seniors bless their hearts think of it as the mailing address or phone number being in the old school yellow pages.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?