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California Politicians Want To Force All Social Networks To Be Private By Default
from the and-to-delete-content dept
We keep seeing "privacy" laws being proposed by politicians who don't seem to recognize the unintended consequences of what they're proposing. The latest comes from my home state of California, where a bill is making its way through the legislature that would require the default settings on social networks be to keep everything private. On top of that, it would require that sites remove any personally identifying information -- including photos -- within 48 hours of a user's request.
You can recognize why a politician (or even individuals) might like the sound of this without thinking through what it might actually mean. In the bill itself social networking websites are defined as:
The thing is, while there may be serious privacy risks on certain websites, this bill doesn't really address any of them. Instead, it seems to pick a random, non-existent problem, and try to solve it. Take, for example, Twitter. It would clearly fall under this law, but the whole point of Twitter (for the most part) is to be able to communicate publicly. Why force all new users to default to a "private setting"?
You can recognize why a politician (or even individuals) might like the sound of this without thinking through what it might actually mean. In the bill itself social networking websites are defined as:
an Internet Web-based service that allows an individual to construct a public or partly public profile within a bounded system, articulate a list of other users with whom the individual shares a connection, and view and traverse his or her list of connections and those made by others in the system.This is trimmed down from a longer, more vague, description, but it's still troublesome. For example, Techdirt allows people to create public profiles. While we don't have a system to let people share connections, we've certainly had people ask about it, and I know other blog sites have enabled similar capabilities. But, at the same time, our long-standing policy is that we don't remove comments from people. Yet, if this law passes, we'd run the risk of $10,000 for potential violations.
The thing is, while there may be serious privacy risks on certain websites, this bill doesn't really address any of them. Instead, it seems to pick a random, non-existent problem, and try to solve it. Take, for example, Twitter. It would clearly fall under this law, but the whole point of Twitter (for the most part) is to be able to communicate publicly. Why force all new users to default to a "private setting"?
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Reader Comments (rss)
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Bullshit like this is why I moved away. Haven't you broken off and slid into the ocean yet? Just go away. Grrrrrrrrr....
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Honestly...
Its easier to fix non-existent issues than real ones.
Look! I just made it so people who can't read don't need to read my posts by not requiring them to read what I have written! I am so great, I should run for public office!
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It's what I use those networks for, to have an easy way to communicate with those specific people.
I don't want to see the spam from whoever burying a post from say, my brother or a friend, where I have to then search through all the clutter and possibly miss something.
I understand I won't be overthrowing a countries government this way, but those were not my intentions when I signed up.
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CA Legislator
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Re: Honestly...
In order not to infringe upon your patent, I hereby require all people to read this post, whether or not they are actually able to read.
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Unsocial networks
Facevault.
You put all of your public information into it, and nobody is ever allowed to see it.
(Except advertisers.)
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Anonymotity
What's wrong with that?
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I think they're fighting themselves here.
If they start removing personal information or locking it down tighter, that just means that the number of doors kicked down with no-knock warrants (and more frequently, no-knock, no-warrants) is going to increase. At least with the information freely available, they've got a better chance of storming the right house occasionally.
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Re: Anonymotity
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Perhaps if it was optional?
But I think requiring social media to be private by default would be onerous and unenforceable.
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Submit or Die
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Re: Perhaps if it was optional?
I mean, the idea behind this law isn't so bad, despite its implementation. I'm sure most people here agree that wireless routers should have encryption on by default, right? I like the idea of privacy being opt-out for a change.
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Re:
Maybe one day it will slide off into the Pacific as we all sing "nah nah NAH nah, nah nah NAH nah, hey hey hey, goodbye!"
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Ladies and Gentleman
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Re: Re: Anonymotity
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Re: Re: Perhaps if it was optional?
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Re: Re:
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