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Facebook's Plan To Merge WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger Sounds a Privacy Alarm (technologyreview.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the heads-up dept.

Facebook's new plan to integrate WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger will lead to more data about users being shared between them, a new report warns. The effort to make it easier for people to participate in conversations across its various messaging platforms sounds harmless, but it raises issues about how data will be shared across the platforms, and with third parties. The good news is that the apps will all be required to use end-to-end encryption. MIT Technology Review reports: Facebook says it wants to make it easier for people to communicate across its "ecosystem" of apps. But the real driver here is a commercial one. By making it easier to swap messages, Facebook can mine even more data to target ads with, and come up with more money-spinning services. There's another potential benefit: by integrating its messaging apps more tightly, Facebook can argue it would be harder to spin one or more of them off, as some antitrust campaigners think it should be forced to do.

10 of 93 comments (clear)

  1. A privacy alarm? On FACEBOOK? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    You're using these FB products and you're worried about PRIVACY, like, at all!?!? Hahahahaha, morons. The fuck out of here with this, anyone who gives a fuck wouldn't touch FB with anything but a subpoena.

  2. There is another angle... by gosand · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They can also tap into users that don't use all of those platforms. e.g. I used WA for a few years before FB bought them. I abandoned Instagram several years ago, and have never used FB. BUT - now they will be able to more accurately track me, because they will have access to my WA data in FB. I am sure this will be done in a straight-forward way with an amended TOS that I may or may not ever see.

    Yes, I can see the efficiencies of combining the back-ends from an operational perspective, but that is only a very small piece of the pie. Being able to more completely track people's information and triangulate on them is much more valuable.

    --

    My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.

    1. Re:There is another angle... by RedK · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It's not like they don't already track you. Even if you don't have a Facebook account, you have a Facebook account. It just doesn't get activated until you actually "sign up". But it's there, collecting data about you and your habits still.

      These "Shadow profiles" already know who you're friends with, when you went out and where you went to eat, who you're dating, probably even your job, your education.

      It's all gathered from your friend's contact lists, posts, pictures.

      --
      "Not to mention all the idiots who use words like boxen."
      Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, @06:49PM
  3. velcro shoes by Hognoxious · · Score: 4

    will lead to more data about users being shared between them

    Somebody believes they aren't doing this with everything already?

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  4. Re:There is no legitinate antitrust case by newbie_fantod · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Definitely not a railroad, closer to a phone company...
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakup_of_the_Bell_System/

  5. Non profit by backslashdot · · Score: 5, Interesting

    We should be asking that

    1. All the central messenger servers be placed under the rotating (5 year?) control of a non-profit organization such as Mozilla, Apache, or Wikipedia.

    2. All protocols utilize end-to-end encryption.

    3. Protocol must be published as an open standard.

    Users can be free to use any (well behaved) third-party client to connect to those services. The producers of those clients will be strongly encouraged (not to mention incentivized to donate to the organization that is running the central server).

    1. Re:Non profit by at.drinian · · Score: 3, Informative

      Signal fulfills your first, second, and third requirements nicely, although I see why you suggest rotating responsibility. Your fourth requirement, allowing third-party clients, is sort of implicitly allowed but not encouraged, I think.

    2. Re:Non profit by cosmo42 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Check out Matrix. It's growing fast and also has excellent support on bridging existing IM's into it. It's already a better IRC client than any IRC client.

  6. Re:Do not want by LostMonk · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There problem isn't finding a replacement for WhatsApp, convincing your contacts to migrate with you is the difficulty.

  7. Re: There is no legitinate antitrust case by c6gunner · · Score: 3, Interesting

    End to end enceyption just means they cant view your messages in transit. They own the app. That means they can still view the message at either end point, plus display whatever ads they want in the chat window. I have no evidence that they DO spy on us at the endpoints, but they certainly CAN.

    That's why the protocol isn't open. If I could write my own app to use the WhatsApp protocol they would lose all ability to spy on me or advertise to me. Even if they're not doing it now, they definitely want to have the option in the future.