A coalition of European data protection officials have warned social-networking site Facebook for putting users' privacy at risk due to the changes it brought to its service. In a letter addressed to the social networking company, officials advising European Commission have said that changes to its default settings in December were 'unacceptable'. The letter is from Article 29 Working Party, an influential group of data protection officials from 31 countries, which advises the European Commission on privacy matters.
Facebook recently modified its site to automatically share profile information with partners such as Pandora, Microsoft Docs.com and Yelp. Users can opt out by unchecking a specific box within Facebook's settings. The site also expanded the amount of information publicly shared. The working party has reportedly informed Facebook of the need for default settings that would only allow access to profile information and friends to self-selected contacts, and that access by search engines should be the explicit choice of users.
This is reportedly the strongest rebuke yet for the US Company from European data protection officials. Richard Allen, Facebook's director of public policy in Europe, has said that that he was considering the company's response to the letter. Facebook has made adjustments to address privacy concerns raised by European regulators in the past. However, Allen has said that there could be some areas where the company would be unwilling to compromise.
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