OPEN LETTER TO MR MARC ZUCKERBERG FOUNDER FACEBOOK

Dear Mr. Zuckerberg,

I was really moved by the letter you wrote to all us Fb users and shown your concern about our data security. More particularly when you initiated the communications with, “We have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can't then we don't deserve to serve you.”

A small question strikes my mind at this juncture about dilemma you are facing now. Are you worried by the activities of app users and other developers who are making more money than you or are you really concerned and worried about safety, security and privacy of the individual’s data which you have obtained through your social media platform? It also needs to be reminded why this platform was created by you. Was it for the concern of mankind that individuals are becoming more aloof and as man is social animal by birth he should be provided with such an opportunity to become more social or was their any clandestine and surreptitious motive of making huge money by exploiting private and personal sensitive information of the users?

Are you worried that by this open-secret compromise/sale of data of million of the users by your various like minded app partners, there may be stringent Privacy laws by various governments world over and your money minting machine ,Facebook, will be under tremendous pressure and will face huge legal battles world over? I certainly foresee the correction stage for social media with stringent regulatory mechanisms for data protection.

Your acknowledgements, “But we also made mistakes, there's more to do, and we need to step up and do it” certainly needs to be scrutinised and doesn’t absolve you from the facts that you were aware about the writing on the wall.

In timeline of your confession, you have stated your pious intention of launching FB in 2007, was of making people more social and thereby encouraging them to share more information about themselves and their friends. Your intention was people should know more about each others through various apps permitted and installed on your platform (which made monitory favours to your company) for showing their locations, pictures, likings, activities etc. The beauty of these apps was that they not only accessed all information about the actual users who has installed such app but also accessed all the information of the friends of the user who downloaded such app. In simple words if A is having 100 friends in his friends list and A has downloaded such app then that app will get access to information of all the 100 friends of A.

So by targeting single person private confidential information of all his friends could be accessed by owner of such app, even though such friends have not consented for access of such information or downloaded such app. Isn’t it strange and fraud you have committed on many innocent FB users? You need to answer the same Mr. Zuckerberg.

It is audaciously admitted that FB was aware about such practises till 2013 and hence they modified their policies in 2014 after which such friends were asked for their consent from the concerned app prior to accessing their information or were required to download the app itself.

Another feature you introduced in 2014 was that if Developer of app wanted to access sensitive personal information of the user then he should seek permission of FB for doing so and in my words you could ask for more money to access such private sensitive personal data. Mr. Zuckerberg, You must share this information that how many developers have asked for such permission from you after 2014 and on what terms and conditions including monitory details such permission was granted and to how many developers such permission was refused to?

As per your version you came to know in 2015 that such private data was compromised by personality development app developed by Kogan with a UK based company engaged in data analytics, in the name of Cambridge Analytica and misused for activities not permitted by you. You also asked Kogan and Cambridge Analytica to provide data deletion certifications but miserably failed to notify the innocent people whose data was compromised by these two culprits and thereby you can also be termed as a partner in crime.

You deliberately kept mum about this incidence till 2018 and when this has again surfaced in public domain you are defending your case for a clean chit. It needs explanation for your so called long silence of three years.

This is certainly a battle to save your own platform which has made you rich and famous but at the same time People across the world have realised the real intentions of social media platforms and now they will be compelled to think twice before they post any such activities on such platforms. They would realise that Big Brother is watching and analysing their every digital footprint for some monitory gains and would always be wiser by every passing day. The Data, platforms like you are getting, will certainly be on decline in coming daya and hence you appealed, “We will learn from this experience to secure our platform further and make our community safer for everyone going forward.”

Mr. Zukerberg, I believe you are emotionally fooling the people by using clever words like our community, but in reality it meant that Staff and Management of Facebook and not the actual Facebook users. These crocodile tears won’t serve any purpose and there are many volunteers globally, who have joined this movement of exposing real intentions of social media platforms of making money by even playing with security and confidentiality of the sensitive personal information of their users and in larger run may jeopardise with national security also.

So my humble appeal is to answer the silly questions raised through this Open Letter so that this issue could be settled at once.

Advocate Mahendra Limaye

Cyber Legal Consultant

FOUNDER CYBER AWARENESS ORGANISATION

Founder CYBER CRIME HELPLINE 7219109619/922510990

09422109619

FACEBOOK, CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA AND WHAT LESSONS INDIA NEEDS TO LEARN?????

The recent controversy regarding published reports that data analysis firm Cambridge Analytica tried to influence how Americans voted in recent US Presidential Elections in which Mr. Donald Trump won, using information gathered from millions of Facebook profiles has very severe and long lasting impact on Cyberspace and life of netizens.

Those who are not aware about what all this hue and cry is all about, let me explain in simple words.

Facebook gave permission (obviously with some monitory considerations) to University of Cambridge psychology professor Aleksandr Kogan to collect information from its users who downloaded his app — "thisisyourdigitallife." The app offered a personality test. But Facebook users who downloaded the app also gave the professor permission to collect data about their location, their friends and content they had "liked." It is alleged that Kogan provided that data — which included information from over 50 million profiles — to Cambridge Analytica, a firm which was working to develop techniques that could be used to influence voters and thereby assisting Mr. Donald Trump to run its Social media campaign in US presidential election similar to one Mr. Narendra Modi used in Indian Parliamentary elections in 2014.

Now real questions are 1) Whether Facebook is transparent enough with users about how their information would be used? 2) Should it have done more to keep tabs on how third parties were using data? 3) Could such business model, which is based on selling user data to app developers and advertisers be termed as ethical and allowed to be used? 4) Should governments across the world partner with Facebook or such companies in its various social media initiatives?

It is open secret that personal data of the Users is extracted from the social media platforms and various apps and used for a purpose to which they did not consent for or even doesn’t suspect about such intentions of these platforms. In my view it is not fault of the million of the users but it’s our collective failure who failed to warn them about what could happen through excessive use of these platforms.

The blame is on us who failed to read the eminent which was written on the wall.

Facebook or for that matter any social media platform or app have a dubious track record on privacy. Their business model is built only on gathering data like your real name, who your friends are, your likes and interests, where you have been, what websites you have visited, what you look like and how you speak. They commercially exploit all this data to make it super easy for their customers – advertisers – to target you and thereby minting money themselves. And we are very fond of so called Free Humanitarian services rendered by these platforms for betterment of mankind and welfare of entire human race.

So the lessons we need to learn from this incident in my view are as follows.

1)   We should immediately stop people from compelling to use social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter or Google for any government related activities.

2)   Government should stop use of Social Media Platforms for promoting their welfare as well as other initiatives wherein registration of users is must on those platforms.

3)   Government should call back all the sensitive personal data these social Medias have extracted during their involvement in various government’s initiative.

4)   Government should proactively initiate a Cyber Awareness Campaign informing and educating people about inbuilt traps in such Digital platforms and how to protect their privacy and personal information.

5)   Government has the right opportunity to create Indigenous social media platform wherein citizen can be assured of no foul play would happen with their data.

6)   Government should migrate more on Print Media rather than on social media releases for any important event or announcement.

7)   There has to be very strict Data Privacy Laws with penal provisions for Data breaches.

Adv. Mahendra Limaye

Cyber Legal Consultant

09422109619