Today, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, (EFF) the world’s leading digital rights and privacy advocacy group, issued its fourth annual “Who Has Your Back” report, and for the first time, Facebook, along with several other tech companies, received six star ratings.
Twitter and regional Californian ISP Sonic, were the sole two tech companies that received six star ratings last year, now Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, Apple, Google, Dropbox and CREDO Mobile all joined the list.
But it is Facebook’s inclusion that is in some ways the most surprising. The social media giant has a reputation, whether it is deserved or not, of being careless with user information. The report by the EFF shows that, at least when it comes to Government requests, Facebook is making major strides.
It’s important to note that while Facebook is making strides in protecting user data against the Government, the report didn’t study how much information Facebook shares with other third parties. They have been making at least a public effort on that front as well.
Five other social media sites/apps received five star ratings and only missed the sixth because they have not taken the Government to court, but otherwise protected user data from the government: LinkedIn, Pinterest, tumblr, WordPress and Wickr.
Wickr competitor Snapchat meanwhile received an industry-wide worst one star rating, scoring points only for “publishing law enforcement guidelines” but does not require a warrant for government data requests, does not tell users about government requests, does not fight for user rights in either courts or in Congress and does not publish transparency reports.
Amazon and Myspace (for anyone still on that) received two stars ratings.
[Photo Credit: Flohuels]
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