Online privacy is a debate that’s been raging for years. With Ofcom’s new changes to its proposed code landing today and the UK Communications bill set to appear in draft form after the Olympics, it’s a debate that’s worth having now more than ever.
But those of us who advocate that governments and ISPs shouldn’t snoop or traffic shape should remember that we’re not all as great at protecting our own privacy as we’d like to be.
Web designer Callum Haywood has launched an experiment in social media awareness in the form of weknowwhatyouredoing.com.
The site pulls data directly from Facebook, data that’s uncensored and freely accessible via the Graph API. Some of the posts make for pretty interesting reading.
The site posts some less than savvy status updates from people slagging off their bosses, complaining of killer hangovers, praising the virtues of controlled substances and publicly sharing their phone numbers – all thoughts perhaps best kept quiet.
Haywood says that “If you see any posts on here that are yours and you want them removing, delete them from Facebook first, then they will stop appearing here (may take up to an hour), or contact me to block any posts by you from appearing.”
If you think it’s bad that Haywood is pulling up people’s status, potentially getting them into trouble, look at it another way; if he can do it anyone can. What if your boss was keeping an eye on you and you hadn’t set your Facebook posts to private?
The intention of the site is to shock people into being more careful about what they share and when they share it. Privacy arguments go out of the window the moment we willingly give away literally too much information.
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