By John Oates for The Register. This story has
been reproduced with permission.
Facebook accounts can be "deactivated" but not actually deleted.
Your profile remains in the Facebook servers but cannot be accessed
by anyone else.
The Information Commissioner confirmed to the Register
that it has received a complaint and will investigate the firm.
The ICO sent us the following statement: "Many people are
posting content on social networking sites without thinking about
the electronic footprint they leave behind. It is important that
individuals consider this when putting information online. However,
it is equally important that websites also take some
responsibility.
"In particular, they should ensure that personal information is
not retained for longer than necessary especially when the
information relates to a person who no longer uses the site.
Organisations can ensure personal information is effectively
protected by complying with the principles of the Data Protection
Act. We will be publishing research on the need for people to
protect information of a personal nature online later in
November."
There's more from Channel 4 here.
Facebook's terms and conditions make it clear that you give up
just about any rights to anything you post on the site.
In other news, Facebook yesterday denied it was interested in
buying Chinese social networking site Zhanzou, which has seven
million users. Reports claimed Facebook was prepared to offer
$85m for the site.
© The Register
2007
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