The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) and other advocacy groups filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against Facebook.com alleging that recent changes to the social network’s privacy settings are unfair and deceptive trade practices.  EPIC highlights Facebook.com’s history of changes to its privacy practices and policies in the complaint, including a number of changes in 2009 that were reversed due to consumer complaints.  However, the more recent changes of November 19, 2009 and December 9, 2009 prompted the groups to file a complaint requesting an FTC investigation.

EPIC alleges that these changes will allow more information to be publicly available via search engines and third-party applications.  For instance, Facebook.com’s updated privacy policy treats the following information as publicly available information: (1) name; (2) profile photo; (3) list of friends; (4) fan pages; (5) gender; (6) geographic regions, and (7) networks.  Under the site’s default settings, this publicly available information is available to all Internet users via standard search engines.

These changes, EPIC argues, are unfair and deceptive trade practices under Section 5 of the FTC Act.  For instance, EPIC claims that Facebook.com has repeatedly represented that users “have extensive and precise controls available to choose who see what among their network and friends.”  However, Facebook.com no longer allows users to restrict access to the above categories of publicly available information.  EPIC has asked that the FTC compel Facebook.com to restore its previous privacy settings and to make its data collection policies clearer and more comprehensible.

Arent Fox is following the status of this complaint.  For further information, please contact:

Anthony V. Lupo
lupo.anthony@arentfox.com
202.857.6353

Matthew R. Mills
mills.matthew@arentfox.com
202.715.8582