Privacy on Facebook

Forums › Social networks, social media and tools › Privacy on Facebook

alasta

6889 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3363

Trusted

Subscriber

#264317 16-Jan-2020 11:56

Lately I have been thinking about how to minimise the amount of data that Facebook can collect about me, and it has raised a few questions that I don't have the technical knowledge to answer. In particular:

Am I right in thinking that many popular web sites have elements that link back to Facebook which allow Facebook to track which sites you've been viewing?
If the answer to the above is yes, then can you mitigate it by ensuring that you log out of Facebook every time you use it?
If the answer to the above is yes, then would you also have to log out of the Facebook app on your phone as well as the web based interface?

I would be very interested if anyone has any thoughts on the above.

xpd

Geek of Coastguard
14116 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 4579

Retired Mod

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2398896 16-Jan-2020 12:10

1) I'd say yes, regardless if you're using FB as your authentication for that site.

2) Log out and use incognito mode, I'd say yes.

3) No - if browser is logged into something like Google , maybe but cant guarantee it.

But I could be completely wrong with my answers.

If you're on Facebook, you have no real privacy is the way I look at it.

XPD / Gavin

LinkTree

Dynamic

4015 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1851

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2398900 16-Jan-2020 12:14

xpd: If you're on Facebook, you have no real privacy is the way I look at it.

This: ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

Having said that, I do use Facebook but crank my privacy settings to the max and review them regularly.

“Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including this, I suppose.” Douglas Adams

SirHumphreyAppleby

2939 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1860

#2398907 16-Jan-2020 12:16

Many sites do include content from Facebook. While I am not familiar with the Facebook APIs, disabling acess under the "Apps and websites" settings on Facebook will minimise the amount of data available to third parties. This will also disable the ability to use Facebook to login to third party sites (a silly idea anyway, IMO).

Most modern browsers typically don't include referral information, so Facebook won't necessarily know what page you're browsing based on a request to Facebook servers alone unless there is a unique ID. Google Ads uses a unique ID for every site, so they probably do know more about your browsing than Facebook. I trust neither.

Even if you log out, any request to Facebook will pass their cookies, so you either need to delete those cookies or use a private browser instance to prevent them from sending information which could associate the request with your account.

michaelmurfy

meow
13579 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 10910

Moderator

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2399027 16-Jan-2020 13:48

I personally use both an iPhone (which restricts what Facebook can collect) along with Firefox with Facebook Container enabled.

I still need Facebook - it is my line of communication to multiple people and also convenient to have Messenger but hopefully by using Firefox I have severely limited what it can track on me.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
Referral Links: Quic Broadband (use R122101E7CV7Q for free setup)

Are you happy with what you get from Geekzone? Please consider supporting us by subscribing.
Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

ShinyChrome

1603 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 686

ID Verified

Trusted

#2399036 16-Jan-2020 13:58

+1 to either incognito mode or FireFox Containers. I also use EFF's Privacy Badger for however much that helps.

Really, you are the greatest threat to your data security. Most people (including me) can't be arsed signing in and out all the time or clearing cookies. Password Managers make it a bit easier to do though.

Don't worry, Google has you covered though... /s

Unfortunately, fingerprinting is where a lot of services are at though, which requires even more effort to evade.

wellygary

8810 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 5287

#2399042 16-Jan-2020 14:03

To be honest If you still need to use Facebook and are really concerned for your privacy, then air gap facebook from the rest of your computing...

Grab old PC/laptop and make that your facebook machine, don't do anything else on it......

Facebook and the like are so intrusive and I really don't expect them to even follow the rules they say the will. so simply don't trust them anywhere near anything else...

Dyson

Shop now for Dyson appliances (affiliate link).

geekiegeek

2513 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 625
Inactive user

#2399055 16-Jan-2020 14:25

Even if you are not logged in and have never set up a Facebook profile, Facebook can create a shadow profile of you - https://medium.com/@SpiderOak/facebook-shadow-profiles-a-profile-of-you-that-you-never-created-302f99f20930

Like others have said, you can limit the ability for FB and others to track you but its pretty hard to completely avoid - there are literally 100s of trackers on the web building profiles of you - https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/23/opinion/data-internet-privacy-tracking.html

You can probably tell from my sig that I'm not a fan of FB or any other company that uses your information as a product. Once you start digging into what these companies are doing it gets pretty scary. Check out Jaron Lanier's book 10 Arguments for deleting Social Media, https://www.ft.com/content/a3ea16f6-7edd-11e8-bc55-50daf11b720d

afe66

3181 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1678

Lifetime subscriber

#2399057 16-Jan-2020 14:26

I only access Facebook within a Mint virtual machine and use the guest login which says everything is deleted when I log out of guest mode.

But then I only use facebook for some ev groups and have no friends..

Oblivian

7345 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2117

ID Verified

#2399061 16-Jan-2020 14:33

Check out 'the great hack' on netflix.

Gives you a bit of the tech insight along with the political hoo-ha about how much every small Interaction, like, comment, thing you do builds a massively accurate profile of your digital self.

You build a corporate API 1-way communicated focused page, or you have a 'personal' one that is going to get exploited.

alasta

6889 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3363

Trusted

Subscriber

#2399094 16-Jan-2020 15:37

Thanks everyone - it's a fascinating subject.

I try to avoid Facebook and Google as their business model makes me really uncomfortable. Unfortunately many of my friends insist on communicating with me via Facebook so I can't quite bring myself to delete my profile so I'm just trying to work out how I can at least limit the damage.

Based on what I've understood of this, I think I will avoid using Facebook in any web browser and just sparingly use the iPhone app with all the dubious permissions disabled so it can't access my contacts or photos. I will also log out of Facebook from my web browser and delete their cookies. I'm sure it's not a perfect solution, but it'll do for now.