Facebook faces class action over Beacon
Social network company Facebook has been slapped with a class action suit because of its controversial Beacon advertising system.
The suit claims that Facebook aggregated users’ online activity and then shared it with friends without requesting for permission first.
Facebook has dealt with previous privacy law disputes, prior to this lawsuit launched by its own users.
Blockbuster, who was also involved in the Beacon debacle, was similarly sued in a class action regarding user privacy issues earlier this year.
Beacon was designed to grab data on users from external affiliate websites, such as Blockbuster or Overstock, and then share that information with people’s social circle through their profile page.
When privacy advocates protested at this system, Facebook changed its policies to make Beacon opt-in and also the option to turn off the function completely.
Despite Facebook’s back-peddling, 32 plaintiffs who were affected before the changes were made are now looking to further restrictions on the Beacon system, deletion of data already collected and unspecified damages.
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