Facebook confront a fine from a German privacy governor for failing to get the consent of the mass whose contact detail it lay in .
At issue are the internet site ’s invitation and savoir-faire - book synchronisation functions , through which it uploads and stores middleman data from the e - chain armour and mobile speech sound name and address books of its users .
The problem , allot to the Hamburg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information , is that some of that personal selective information relates to hoi polloi who are not Facebook user , and who have not given their permission for the site to store their personal information , nor use it for marketing purposes .
When someone creates a Facebook report , they are invite to upload their e - mail address books to the site so that it can send einsteinium - mail invitation to their physical contact to join Facebook , or distinguish those of their contact that are already Facebook users to intimate that they become Facebook friends .
If the Facebook user pick out not to ship an e - mail invitation to a liaison who is not yet a Facebook user , that contact ’s e - post speech is stored anyway , associated with that of the substance abuser who upload it .
Facebook regularly invites users , through their invoice page , to “ bring mass you do it as friends . ”
exploiter are exhibit exposure of people in networks they have bring together ( and perhaps since go out ) , and of friends of friends — but Facebook will also show a user other masses who have upload their due east - mail address , perhaps people with whom they have had no middleman for years , but who have not houseclean out their speech book meanwhile .
Many citizen of the German state of Hamburg have complained in recent months of Facebook pass their contact information to third company and storing data about their relationship in this way , accord to Johannes Caspar , caput of the state of matter ’s data protection service .
Such storage of data point by third parties is “ inadmissible ” because of its implications for data protection , he said .
Facebook confirmed on Thursday that it received a alphabetic character from Caspar ’s office .
“ We are currently review the letter and will answer to it within the give time frame , ” according to a brief statement .
Facebook is not the only social internet to tender such champion - happen part or to misuse data in this way , but the large , Caspar said in a assertion issued Wednesday .
“ That does n’t mean that social networks should be storing data about people who are not members of those networks , ” he said .
The Commissioner is also interested about Facebook ’s practice of sending out atomic number 99 - ring armour invitation on behalf of its user , evoke that this may fall foul of exist laws prohibit certain kinds of direct mail .
Facebook has until Aug. 11 to make its case to the data protection commissioner if it wishes to avoid a mulct .
Hamburg bring a hard line on data trade protection : It iskeeping a close eye on Google ’s ingathering of data for its Street View service , which adds panoramic views of streets to the troupe ’s mathematical function service . Germans have a rightfulness to react any publication of their own image , or that of their mansion , the governor says , while Google ’s view is that it is ok to issue such images , as long as it gives mass the option to have them removed later .
Google is in particular worry with data protection authorities in Hamburg , and in France , Italy and Spain , forrecording traffic on unencrypted Wi - Fi networks as the cars shoot pictures for the Street View service drove by . Some of the traffic recorded let in vitamin E - mail service usernames and passwords , as well as personal communications , harmonise to a preliminary report by the Gallic privacy regulator .
update at 9:43 a.m. PT with a input from Facebook .
