Total sellout of privacy for profit: Facebook betrays its users by selling their information to the highest bidder
By victoriab // 2019-03-25
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Once again, the Facebook team has shown their true colors by betraying the trust of millions of users, and offering up access to their most personal and private information for profit. The Silicon Valley leader has been caught violating their own data sharing policies, for the benefit of some of their most prestigious clients. Companies like Amazon, Microsoft, Sony and Netflix have been enjoying the special privilege of being able to read, write and even delete Facebook users' private messages. Isn't that something? The tech industry has been involved in countless scandals as of late; whether its conspiring to throw elections, censoring conservative content or violating user privacy, Big Tech is at the helm of controversy. It is no wonder then, that massive amounts of people are leaving Facebook and other social media platforms.

Facebook sells out users and their data

A shocking investigation led by The New York Times has revealed that Facebook has been giving at least 150 of the world's largest companies unbridled access to its users' personal information. As the report reveals, these companies have been privy to a far more intrusive level of personal data than Facebook has ever been willing to admit. Info Wars reports:
The Times interviewed over 60 people including current and former employees of Facebook and its partners, former government officials and privacy advocates – and reviewed over 270 pages of Facebook’s internal documents while performing technical tests and analysis to monitor what data Facebook has been handing out like candy.
The Times investigation uncovered an internal Facebook document, in which the company emphasized that "personal data is the most prized commodity of the digital age," and it is being traded by some of the most powerful companies in the world. In what is possibly the largest Facebook scandal to date, the personal information of over 400 million users was given away to hundreds of the world's most influential companies, including Microsoft, Google and other partners, for free. Facebook traded information on its users, and violated their perceived and expected levels of privacy, to support industry relations and to advance the company's own agenda. Supposedly, this exchange was intended to benefit everyone -- except perhaps Facebook users, who are nothing more than guinea pigs in the social media mind control experiment. Under this "trade," Facebook gave companies access to users' most private information, including their personal messages. Companies like Netflix were even granted the ability to read and delete users' messages. Since the Times report, Netflix has stated that it never read anyone's private messages and claims the company never requested such intrusive access.

What happened to privacy?

While Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly promised that users "have complete control" over what and how much data they share, this shocking investigation has proven that simply isn't true. Countless companies have gained access to all sorts of user data -- including Facebook's unique user IDs, which is a serious safety risk. As Info Wars reports:
Facebook was able to circumvent a 2011 consent agreement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) which barred the company from sharing user data without explicit permission, because Facebook considered the partners extensions of itself – “service providers that allowed users to interact with their Facebook friends.” This allowed the company to grant such unprecedented access to everyone’s information. The partners were reportedly prohibited from using the personal information from purposes outside the scope of their agreement, however there has been little to no oversight.
Facebook has been taking advantage of this little loophole for years. The FTC has repeatedly come under fire for failing to act, even though agency officials admit that this "loophole" shouldn't even exist. See more coverage of the latest privacy violations by Big Tech at Surveillance.news. Sources for this article include: InfoWars.com TheGuardian.com
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