The Perils of Facebook

I use Facebook in much the same way as the author of the Washington Post article, limiting the personal information posted on the website and refusing to download (most) applications.  However, the reasons that I have for being wary seem to be different from those of the article's author. She is worried that the third parties which develop applications will abuse and hoard the information which she posts on Facebook, whereas I am more worried about the spyware and viruses that can get onto your computer when these applications hide links to websites outside of Facebook.

There is really no reason to fear large corporations; their motives are solely monetary.  They are interested in our money and we are more than happy to fork it over for the right product/service.   Websites like Facebook, which have shareholders like Microsoft, are not suspect to damage your computer or to use any data unreasonably.  There are much more profitable ways to devote energy to.  It is only the third party application developers which present any real threat, as they can be anyone with any motive anywhere-- and there's not much that anyone can really do to stop a "nefarious" third party.

It really all boils down to the oft used adage: never ever put anything on the internet you wouldn't want your math teacher, future boss, or mother to see.  When you start posting things that you would be uncomfortable with those people seeing, you run a risk that you should, at the very least, be aware of.  And as the article also points out, many internet users are not sophisticated enough to think in this way. 

There was one thing which I did not understand, and that was the article's focus on how long data could be retained, including deleted data going back for years.  The Facebook Terms of Use merely reserve the right to retain this information, but there is absolutely no reason for Facebook to want data about you from 2004.  They want to know what interests you now, what you're willing to buy now.  Certainly some data will be retained, but not on a large scale because of its relative uselessness.  If data is not pertinent to business, there is no reason to retain it because any data has to be stored somehow and that storage is not free.