Facebook - scary

[Floater 7]

FB has it's good points and bad. I certainly understand my friends and family that choose to not use it. Email always works for those that don't like it. But FB so popular with Thais, I use it, for them. And since I speak little Thai, and they speak little English, a picture can say more.

But I can see a day, when I no longer use FB, because it is being used by agencies whos radar, Id rather not be on.

[smotherb]

Thankfully Facebook shows up to me as something I might know and most certainly will never sign up with. If people can't stay in touch with me because I'm not on Facebook then that there is it's best service for weeding out those who are unworthy of being in touch with in the first place.

Ah, but facebook is just another online time-waster/spender, like TV. We can sit here and procrastinate on our needed chores and kibutz on others' lives and personal situations. Just don't give them any correct data. Be careful of what you submit to them. Mention no names, times, dates, places. In fact, don't comment at all, just stay away.

[skiller]

facebook - just lie with name and date of birth, George Orwell was correct

Nice idea, but it doesn't work.

For one of my jobs I created a fake profile with a new email address created just for it & unused mobile number.

no contacts

no friends

no history

no personal details

nothing that could be linked to me.

FB still listed over 20 people - inc rels - that I know locally and OS. With so many people in the world supposedly using FB, I find it hard to believe they are 'random selection'.

Data mining from your computer is likely.

ISP addy more than likely. Try again with a VPN

and delete your cookies.......

[jayceenik]

facebook is what you make of it.

I love it as a social contacts enabler.

One of the very first request I received for fb friendship was from a long time ago (student days !!) Belgian girlfriend.

The algorithm suggested me to her.

She is now a widow. I stayed at her place when I vacationed in Europe a couple years back.

We email each other almost daily.

Another was an ex-colleague from my days in Katanga. New to fb he looked for my name.

A recent request was from the son of a best friend who died more than a decade ago. Looked for my name on fb.

My lovely 27yo Pattaya TGF is super busy with her friends on fb.

Maybe you fb hater luddites should also consider going back to snail mail because you've received a few too many Viagra/penis-enlargement/lottery-win/Nigerian-prince spam in your email box...

And getting off the Internet !! So many viruses there !!!

[off road pat]

one day I was looking up information on Tripad Amplifiers on google. and the next days there were advertisements on FB about Tripad amplifiers.....I had never made queries on Fb for that..... just for your information.....!!!

[MrTee]

facebook is what you make of it.

I love it as a social contacts enabler.

One of the very first request I received for fb friendship was from a long time ago (student days !!) Belgian girlfriend.

The algorithm suggested me to her.

She is now a widow. I stayed at her place when I vacationed in Europe a couple years back.

We email each other almost daily.

Another was an ex-colleague from my days in Katanga. New to fb he looked for my name.

A recent request was from the son of a best friend who died more than a decade ago. Looked for my name on fb.

My lovely 27yo Pattaya TGF is super busy with her friends on fb.

Maybe you fb hater luddites should also consider going back to snail mail because you've received a few too many Viagra/penis-enlargement/lottery-win/Nigerian-prince spam in your email box...

And getting off the Internet !! So many viruses there !!!

I think its a great communication tool -- But users should be more aware of correctly setting privacy/security for their needs.

The ever changing game that facebook play with privacy settings doesn't help, but its up to users to educate themselves..

[MrTee]

facebook - just lie with name and date of birth, George Orwell was correct

Nice idea, but it doesn't work.

For one of my jobs I created a fake profile with a new email address created just for it & unused mobile number.

no contacts

no friends

no history

no personal details

nothing that could be linked to me.

FB still listed over 20 people - inc rels - that I know locally and OS. With so many people in the world supposedly using FB, I find it hard to believe they are 'random selection'.

Data mining from your computer is likely.

ISP addy more than likely. Try again with a VPN

and delete your cookies.......

Cookies are a bit old school, but users should be preventing 3rd party cookies and deleting cookies between sessions if you are using different FB profiles is not bad idea

[deepcell]

Have sure you delete all cookies and close all sessions as well, all big websites steal cookies from your machine or just use Tails OS with tor over vpn.

Edited January 25, 2015 by deepcell

[jayceenik]

I really don't care that zillions of fb users know my name, that I live in Thailand, that I like Jazz, that I worked in Canada, Indonesia and Katanga, that I was in the US Army, etc... Only could be that my grand pa would get the scam call that I've been allegedly robbed of everything in Timbuktu and please send $$$ asap by Western Union. Not likely.

This perso info can certainly be used to better target advertisements. Welcome to it. Nothing scary for me about that.

Since a week ago I've been Googling info about a new mid range smartphone and fb has followed me with ads about Lumia (was first choice), than LG (second choice) and now Samsung (my final choice).

Nothing is free in life. Advertisement pays for the immensely useful YouTube, Google and Facebook.

As for hiding my ID and perso profile I'd have missed on making very interesting fb contacts.

Edited January 25, 2015 by jayceenik

[jjablonsky]

facebook - just lie with name and date of birth, George Orwell was correct

They really don't care what your name or D.O.B is. If your using the computer they get your browsing habbits and history, IP address some say they even get your MAC address, not sure if that's true though. But if your using a mobile device forget it, they and your phone provider get everything, addresses, stored emails, phone lists, location. There is absolutely NO PRIVACY on a mobile device.

[Chao Lao Beach]

Being Famous on Facebook is Like Being Rich in Manopoly

[champers]

Facebook is for chavs, teenage girls and women who wish they were still teenage girls.

[Dumbastheycome]

Opt to sync = opt to bare your ass ets. Sim cards now requiring personal details for registration. Warn your Thai friends and family....do not be casual with your "smart cards". Now they be of desirable value for such things because as yet sim registration does not require an identity image.

Indonesia has long since had a similar requirement. But there the seller simply registers it for you in the name of the agency....making the "security" null and pointless. Presumably there could be a problem if a sim card so registered was traced back to that agency/seller over an issue of (?).But an easy excuse in that situation is that you sold a personal phone including a previously registered used sim card and you have no record of who the buyer was or what they have used it for!

All of these requirements are justified as being an attempt to enhance "national security".

They are dictated globally as a facet of proof of complying with genuine democratic systems. ( black humour content ommiited)

[jayceenik]

Facebook is for chavs, teenage girls and women who wish they were still teenage girls.

and for the Arab Spring revolutionaries, maybe ?

[StreetCowboy]

I really don't care that zillions of fb users know my name, that I live in Thailand, that I like Jazz, that I worked in Canada, Indonesia and Katanga, that I was in the US Army, etc... Only could be that my grand pa would get the scam call that I've been allegedly robbed of everything in Timbuktu and please send $$$ asap by Western Union. Not likely.

This perso info can certainly be used to better target advertisements. Welcome to it. Nothing scary for me about that.

Since a week ago I've been Googling info about a new mid range smartphone and fb has followed me with ads about Lumia (was first choice), than LG (second choice) and now Samsung (my final choice).

Nothing is free in life. Advertisement pays for the immensely useful YouTube, Google and Facebook.

As for hiding my ID and perso profile I'd have missed on making very interesting fb contacts.

It's maybe better to get relevant adverts than irrelevant adverts

[BKKdreaming]

the same has happened to me , Facebook account with all wrong info and it still pulls up people I know to be my "friends"

Does Line do the same thing ?

[catmaninoz]

Read the terms and conditions.

They can legally watch us through our cameras and listen to our microphones. Even when we are not using our phones.

Do you really think they keep that information to themselves?

Or is it sold/given to third parties?

Wont be long now.

The infrastructure is in place.

Total government surveillance is genius.

Dont need to install the hardware around the world in buildings as we willingly carry it in our pockets and sign up for it.

[kerrysum]

Thankfully Facebook shows up to me as something I might know and most certainly will never sign up with. If people can't stay in touch with me because I'm not on Facebook then that there is it's best service for weeding out those who are unworthy of being in touch with in the first place.

Amen Brother,

I do not like it either, my Thai family thinks it is great... Personally, never put your stuff, on line. We can talk on the phone, always worked before.

The wife may call it internet bonding, I personally call it, none of their business.....

[williet98248]

Killed my Facebook account several years ago when some guy I never heard of wanted to be my friend. When I checked him out he had 43,000 ''friends'. Screw that. Took me a couple of tries but eventually got completely off Facebook. I correspond with my real friends by email. I admit I am a Luddite. I have nothing in the cloud, don't Tweet, no Instagram, no Line, etc. All my stuff is on a plug in hard drive that I can physically disconnect. Even so I feel vulnerable. Most people don't care...until their email gets hijacked, their bank account gets drained and their in box fills up with crap. All of which has happened to me. And I don't believe 95% of what I read on the internet.

[jayceenik]

Killed my Facebook account several years ago when some guy I never heard of wanted to be my friend. When I checked him out he had 43,000 ''friends'. Screw that. Took me a couple of tries but eventually got completely off Facebook. I correspond with my real friends by email. I admit I am a Luddite. I have nothing in the cloud, don't Tweet, no Instagram, no Line, etc. All my stuff is on a plug in hard drive that I can physically disconnect. Even so I feel vulnerable. Most people don't care...until their email gets hijacked, their bank account gets drained and their in box fills up with crap. All of which has happened to me. And I don't believe 95% of what I read on the internet.

Facebook limits users to 5000 "friends".

Facebook has no limit to the "likes" a page (this is not a Friend) receives from users.

As I'm posting this the Victoria's Secret Facebook page has 27,238,591 "Likes".

[quandow]

Fer cryin' out loud, just use FB as you would any public forum. If you tell one person, it's a secret. If you tell two, it's no longer secret. You post it on FB, the whole WORLD knows! I've had an account since its inception. My "birthday" is 1 April (April Fool's Day) and the year is 1984 in an Orwellian tribute.

[Mudcrab]

Read the terms and conditions.

They can legally watch us through our cameras and listen to our microphones. Even when we are not using our phones.

Do you really think they keep that information to themselves?

Or is it sold/given to third parties?

Wont be long now.

The infrastructure is in place.

Total government surveillance is genius.

Dont need to install the hardware around the world in buildings as we willingly carry it in our pockets and sign up for it.

yeah mate agree with your comments.

However as with all the previous posts there is a fundamental thing missing that face book is very good at.

Facial recognition.

Look at the millions of photos uploaded to Facebook where FB asks you to put a name to a face in a photo.

For the dedicated FB user (and their unwitting "friends") there are thousands of photos of their face in a thousand different orientations all perfectly digitised, and available any where for instant recognition, any where that person may be, where any form of surveillance is available - be it old fashioned CCTV or any handheld digital device in reality.

The Big Brother thing as George O says - maybe not just yet - that will take a political change not a technological change.

Still its a good name after all isn't it ---- Face Book --- cause that is exactly what it is. A digital Book of Faces.

The rest is just nectar to attract.

And like moths to a flame ......................................

[MrTee]

Read the terms and conditions.

They can legally watch us through our cameras and listen to our microphones. Even when we are not using our phones.

Do you really think they keep that information to themselves?

Or is it sold/given to third parties?

Wont be long now.

The infrastructure is in place.

Total government surveillance is genius.

Dont need to install the hardware around the world in buildings as we willingly carry it in our pockets and sign up for it.

yeah mate agree with your comments.

However as with all the previous posts there is a fundamental thing missing that face book is very good at.

Facial recognition.

Look at the millions of photos uploaded to Facebook where FB asks you to put a name to a face in a photo.

For the dedicated FB user (and their unwitting "friends") there are thousands of photos of their face in a thousand different orientations all perfectly digitised, and available any where for instant recognition, any where that person may be, where any form of surveillance is available - be it old fashioned CCTV or any handheld digital device in reality.

The Big Brother thing as George O says - maybe not just yet - that will take a political change not a technological change.

Still its a good name after all isn't it ---- Face Book --- cause that is exactly what it is. A digital Book of Faces.

The rest is just nectar to attract.

And like moths to a flame ......................................

And, of course, "they" cannot do this with all the other information about you that is readily available to those with power?

Anyone interested in you, with the right powers, has been able to track your every move since you first got a mobile phone..

Smart phones give much greater insight into your little world...

Snowden: iPhone has secret software that can be remotely activated to spy on people

Every time you fly, every licence (driving, TV, whatevs) , every visa, every report.. all those photos you've submitted to "authorities" are al used to identify you, every day ..

Certainly every time you travel on a train on London you are scanned, identified, logged - facial recognition has been around for decades.

Every time you drive you car through places like London..

In the West this is way ahead, only a matter of time time before its globally ubiquitous

Even "Google search" has the ability to provide facial recognition to the general public.. dread to think what GCHQ, NSA, NIST get up to with with

What you gonna do? hide in the woods, like a caveman?

Why worry about Facebook having some data about you . - It's not in Facebook interest to "keep that information to its self" they use it to make money - is a business - that's why when it floated on SE it was worth untold billions. at least you know what its doing!

What is scary about Facebook -- is that it can be used as tool to manipulate the population in ways you cannot even imagine - that is very scary and very Orwellian - Already happening.

What is even more worrying and goes far beyond Facebook or Google are the Governments using this technology to control the population(s) - that already happens with or without Facebook..

Edited January 26, 2015 by MrTee

[Patsycat]

I only really started using it last Summer after meeting up with old schoolmates after 30 odd years. These are people who are all over the world. It's nice to see what they are up too.

Mostly they just put silly cartoons and photos on there, they don't tell you what they had for their tea. Some do put pics of their families, especially now some of them are grandparents!!

[anon022]

For heavens sake, get with it, it's 2015 you know

Does that come before or after 1984?

[hdkane]

facebook - just lie with name and date of birth, George Orwell was correct

Watch the documentaries Citizenfour and Terms and Conditions May Apply. Truly scary. Snowden advises everyone to assume that all their data is being monitored.

[sipi]

I don't use facebook or forums often. But what I do say is just the usual stuff you would know within 5 minutes of meeting me.

My name is Phil, wife Tuk, son Morgan, live in Wongchumpu. Would you like a photo?

What are you going to do with that info?

[pgrahmm]

You are correct...it has aligned/suggested me with people I've had but a fleeting relationship years ago.....no wonder the "bad guys" of earth use it to further their purposes....it is a concern - if not an outright alarm....

[pgrahmm]

↑ Of course profit trumps sanity

[Patsycat]

The pic i have on Fussybook of me is about 15 years old, (it's the one i used on here for the nicest looking poster thingy years ago!!) i like to think people remember me like that!! I am going to change it. But, as i said, it's mainly people who i re-met after 30 years who are on there. And they don't give a .

We put on music, photos, funny dog and cat vids etc.

I don't have many friends... and i never "friend" anyone that i don't know. Same on Skype - i get lots of requests from odd people. And i have a total of five people who i Skype.

Signed with love,

Patsy NoMates xxx

Thank the Gods i don't tweet!!

Edited February 28, 2015 by Patsycat