Saturday, March 24, 2018. at 23:05

WASHINGTON - Former Facebook manager Sendi Parakilas said that the profiles of users are "goods" that are being sold every day, and revealed how the data were stolen from users also through popular games.

Parakilas told the Washington Post that he worked for Facebook in 2011 and 2012 and run a team that was responsible for enforcing user data protection rules on the Facebook application platform.

"This platform included well-known and popular games like Candy Crush and Farmville, as well as many others," said Parakilas, one of the former Facebook managers.

According to him, Facebook did not care too much about the protection of user data at that time, and the affair with Cambridge Analytica showed that that did not change in the next few years.

Parakilas, explaining how these platforms work, said that each time a user accepts an application that connects via Facebook appears disclamer in which user is asked to allow the app to access data of the user.

In some cases, the application only requires access to those data that are public on your profile, such as names, surnames, photos, your photos, and some other non-public information.

"At a time when Cambridge Analytica was collecting user data, Facebook allowed developers to access and share your friends' data, even though your friends never even installed that application, nor did they agree that this app uses their data. This made it possible for developers to create huge databases very quickly. There was a way to exclude the option that the app has access to your friends' data, but that option was deeply in Facebook settings, not exactly in all languages, "Parakilas said, adding that very few users knew about that option.

"What's worst, once the data from Facebook server passed to the programmer, Facebook had no longer had control over them, nor did it know for what purposes these data would be used," he added.

Parakilas cited one example of how Facebook resolved, or did not resolve problems with misuse of user data.

"At the end of 2011, Facebook revealed that an application, called Klout, openes Facebook profiles of soul children. These public profiles were not opened by the real children, but they were based on data collected by the Klout application from users who used the application. My job was to call Klout's bosses and ask them if they violated some of Facebook application rules because I could not see, or know what these data vere used for. They assured me that they did not violate any rule. I told them that they had to adhere to our rules, and that was the end of our conversation. Facebook did not take any action on this issue, nor did Klout stop from collecting user data, "he said.

Klout was an application that even publicly appeared to be in violation of the rules, but Parakilas warns that much worse things happened with applications that were not so easy to detect, reports portal B92.net.

Parakilas is convinced that there is one reason why Facebook has never publicly acknowledged such things, nor has it warned the users about it, and that's because they did not want the public to find out about the big hole and weakness of the system that takes care of data security.

"In 2012, I organized a huge presentation to the main management in which I presented to them all the drawbacks of our system. I explained that we left a lot of holes in the system, and that our users are dangerously exposed to external influences. I sent this document to everyone, but I received very little, almost no feedback, "Parakilas said.

(Tanjug)

Source:
http://www.politika.rs/sr/clanak/400742/Bivsi-menadzer-Fejsbuka-Krali-smo-podatke-i-preko-igrica

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IZAKOVIC