Facebook Alert: your privacy could be in danger

A recent change to the Terms of Service on social networking website Facebook has sent shockwaves around the world, finally waking many people up the some of the realities of publishing information on the internet.

Facebook's Terms have always stated that by using their website you give them a perpetual license to use any photos or words you post to it in any way they like.

Now this means that Facebook doesn't own your information, you are just giving them the right to license it. Theoretically this suggests they could license some of your photos and comments for use in a third party's advertising campaign.

The change to the Terms on February 4, 2009 made one crucial change - the aforementioned now remains even after you delete your account.

The Facebook Terms of Service used to state that the license you grant them will "automatically expire" if you deleted your "User Content". The Feb 4 changes saw the following added to replace the expiration: "The following sections will survive any termination of your use of the Facebook Service".

What had most people angry was that users were not given any warning or announcement about the change. This meant that if a user did not like the changes and wanted to delete their account then they were out of luck as the 'you can't terminate our license' policy would already be in place.

This made news headlines around the world, and prompted many protests from Facebook users who were outraged by the change.

On February 18 Facebook gave in to the pressure and reverted to their previous Terms (last changed in September 2008), founder Mark Zuckerberg stating that "we have decided to return to our previous terms of use while we resolve the issues that people have raised."

This is not the first privacy controversy in Facebook's five year history.

In late 2007, a tracking tool called "Beacon" caught many users off-guard by broadcasting information about their online shopping and activities on other websites. Facebook initially defended the practice, but then gave in and allowed users the ability to turn Beacon off.

It seems now is the time to delete your Facebook account if you are concerned about these privacy controversies as the social networking website is likely to reveal a revised Terms of Service in the near future.

The one thing that you should always remember with publishing information (photos, comments, videos - everything is included) on the internet is that while it looks like you have the ability to delete it - most websites will always retain copies to archive.