Facebook said this week that while it is intent on targeting users who post so-called “revenge porn,” the site has yet to review and take a position on legislation currently in Congress that would criminalize the act. “Revenge porn” is the practice of posting intimate or sexually explicit images of someone on the Internet without…

A mother in Alabama was stunned and outraged to discover photos of her 16-month-old daughter had been stolen on Facebook and turned into terrible memes. The images outright made fun of the small child’s appearance, or suggested that she was either mentally handicapped or sick with cancer. “I cried,” the mother said. “That’s all I…

Facebook announced a new feature late last week that will warn users when their profile has been hacked by an individual “suspected of working on behalf of a nation-state.” “While we have always taken steps to secure accounts that we believe to have been compromised, we decided to show this additional warning if we have…

Two top credit-analytics companies are implementing an unconventional way to determine people’s credit scores. Instead of traditional analyzing methods like credit cards, loans and bills, these companies are beginning to look at your Facebook profile. Why are companies doing this? Money, of course. Banks are afraid they’re losing potential customers by not providing loans to…

Last week, a 50-year-old electronics repairman in Philadelphia named Tony Harris posted a photo on Facebook of his wife holding thick stacks of cash. Exactly one week later, three young men broke into his home and murdered him. The original photo included a joking caption from Harris that said “I misplaced $60,000.00. I hope my…

This week, Facebook briefly blocked users from posting the words “everyone will know.” The combination of the sudden weird censorship and ominous-sounding combination of words had some users spooked, though Facebook said it was a simple error. “This was a mistake with our spam filter and our engineers have resolved the issue,” Facebook security communications…

Have you ever noticed someone come up in your Facebook “Suggested Friends” feed that made you stop and think, how does Facebook know I’m connected to that person? If so, many people in the online dating scene can feel your pain; according to some users from apps and sites like Tinder and OKCupid, their matches…

The state of California passed a law last week that offers sweeping digital privacy rights and protections to citizens. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act prevents any state law enforcement agency from “compelling a business” to turn over any data or digital communications without a warrant. The law also prevents these agencies from tracking the location…

The European Union’s top court ruled this week that the “Safe Harbor” agreement allowing private American companies to transfer user data to U.S. servers is, in fact, invalid. The decision will strike a big blow against Facebook and other large tech companies in Europe, and could severely complicate their operations. However, it’s a huge win…

For the past several years, Facebook has been on a persistent public relations offensive to win back users who may be spooked by the site’s privacy policies. One recent example saw a prominent Facebook executive claiming to a UK website that Facebook is not only not harmful to user privacy, but actually actively helpful. “I…