Please Read and Crosspost: Facebook = Snitchgate

This is courtesy of my cousin P-II, whom I just vacationed with, so I am taking it very seriously indeed.

http://paulbernal.wordpress.com/2012/09/21/facebook-snitchgate/

Facebook: snitchgate!
Posted: September 21, 2012 in Facebook, Nymwars, Privacy
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A story about Facebook went around twitter last night that provoked quite a reaction in privacy advocates like me: Facebook, it seems, is experimenting with getting people to ‘snitch’ on any of their friends who don’t use their real names. Take a look at this:

Facebook has had a ‘real names’ policy for a while: this is what their ‘Help Center’ says on the subject:

People in my field have known about this for a long time – it’s been the cause of a few ‘high profile’ events such as when Salman Rushdie had his account suspended because they didn’t believe that he was who he said he was – but few people had taken it very seriously for anyone other than the famous. Everyone knows ‘fake’ names and ‘fake’ accounts – my sister’s dog has a Facebook account – so few believed that Facebook was going to bother enforcing it, except for obvious trolls and so forth. Now, however, that appears to be changing.
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