Facebook: User data passed on to advertising companies
Facebook continues to face criticism over its handling of sensitive user data. The social network confirmed on Monday that a number of applications on Facebook were unauthorizedly accessing users' identification numbers and passing them on to advertising companies or data brokers.
According to a report in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal, each of the ten most popular Facebook applications passes on user data to external companies. According to the report, the applications not only read information from individual users themselves, but in some cases also from their friends. Facebook announced its intention to "dramatically limit" the disclosure of user IDs, which are used to technically link information to a Facebook profile. However, the current disclosure of user ID numbers does not allow access to the private data of Facebook users. According to Facebook programmer Mike Vernal, the media reports about the leak are also "exaggerated". "The developers did not intend to pass on the data," he wrote on the company's website. Rather, incorrect settings in Internet browsers are to blame.
