Pakistanis angry over detentions in Times Sq. case Monday, May 24, 2010
ISLAMABAD – Relatives of three men detained by Pakistan for alleged links to the suspect in the attempted Times Square bombing say the men are innocent.
They
AFP - Thursday, August 6TAIPEI (AFP) - - Taiwan's Beijing-friendly government on Wednesday denied boycotting an Australian film festival amid a row over the e
BERLIN (Reuters) - Chancellor Angela Merkel suffered a double blow on Thursday as a senior party ally in east German
Minister seeks closure of anti-Berlusconi websites Wednesday, December 16, 2009
ROME (AFP) - – The Italian government moved Tuesday to close down Internet sites encouraging further violence against Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who
By ELAINE KURTENBACH,AP Business Writer AP - Wednesday, March 18SHANGHAI - Asia's stock market rally seemed to be running out of steam Wednesday, despite an
Edition:
U.S.
Arabic
Argentina
Brazil
Canada
China
France
Germany
India
Italy
Japan
Latin America
Mexico
Russia
Spain
United Kingdom
Home
Business
Business Home
Economy
Technology
Media
Small Business
Legal
Deals
Earnings
Social Pulse
Business Video
The Freeland File
Aerospace & Defense
Investing Simplified
Markets
Markets Home
U.S. Markets
European Markets
Asian Markets
Global Market Data
Indices
M&A
Stocks
Bonds
Currencies
Commodities
Futures
Funds
peHUB
Dividends
World
World Home
U.S.
Brazil
China
Euro Zone
Japan
Africa
Mexico
Russia
India Insight
World Video
Reuters Investigates
Decoder
Politics
Politics Home
Supreme Court
Politics Video
Tech
Technology Home
MediaFile
Science
Tech Video
Tech Tonic
Social Pulse
Opinion
Opinion Home
Chrystia Freeland
John Lloyd
Felix Salmon
Jack Shafer
David Rohde
Nader Mousavizadeh
Lucy P. Marcus
Nicholas Wapshott
Bethany McLean
Anatole Kaletsky
Zachary Karabell
Edward Hadas
Hugo Dixon
Ian Bremmer
Lawrence Summers
Susan Glasser
The Great Debate
Steven Brill
Reihan Salam
Frederick Kempe
Christopher Papagianis
Mark Leonard
Breakingviews
Equities
Credit
Private Equity
M&A
Macro & Markets
Politics
Breakingviews Video
Money
Money Home
Tax Break
Lipper Awards 2012
Global Investing
MuniLand
Unstructured Finance
Linda Stern
Mark Miller
John Wasik
James Saft
Analyst Research
Alerts
Watchlist
Portfolio
Stock Screener
Fund Screener
Personal Finance Video
Money Clip
Investing 201
Life
Health
Sports
Arts
Faithworld
Business Traveler
Entertainment
Oddly Enough
Lifestyle Video
Pictures
Pictures Home
Reuters Photographers
Full Focus
Video
Reuters TV
Reuters News
Article
Comments (0)
Slideshow
Follow Reuters
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
YouTube
Read
Tel Aviv bus hit by bomb; Hamas celebrates
|
8:12am EST
Egyptian-brokered Hamas-Israel ceasefire takes hold
|
3:47pm EST
Al Jazeera studio in Cairo set on fire in third day of violence
11:31am EST
Florida girl fatally shot on school bus, suspect in custody
20 Nov 2012
India executes last surviving Mumbai attacker, sparks celebrations
8:01am EST
Discussed
150
Israel hammers Hamas in Gaza offensive
139
Egypt PM to visit Gaza in support of Hamas against Israel
108
Gaza truce pressure builds, Cairo in focus
Pictures
Reuters Photojournalism
Our day's top images, in-depth photo essays and offbeat slices of life. See the best of Reuters photography. See more
Gaza conflict
Our latest pictures from inside Israel and Gaza. Slideshow
Battle for Syria
Rare scenes from the fighting inside Syria. Slideshow
Sponsored Links
Facebook to share data with Instagram, loosen email rules
Tweet
Share this
Email
Print
Related News
Petraeus case shows ease of government email snooping
Sat, Nov 17 2012
Exclusive: Facebook offering e-retailers sales tracking tool
Fri, Nov 16 2012
Hedge funds shower love on Green Mountain, Yahoo
Wed, Nov 14 2012
Facebook stock jumps 12.6 percent as share lockup expires
Wed, Nov 14 2012
LinkedIn beats expectations, raises full-year rev view
Thu, Nov 1 2012
Analysis & Opinion
Weibo has reason to “open sesame†to Alibaba
When quants tell stories
Related Topics
Tech »
Media »
Facebook »
1 of 2. A photo illustration shows the applications Facebook and Instagram on the screen of an iPhone in Zagreb April 9, 2012.
Credit: Reuters/Antonio Bronic
By Alexei Oreskovic
SAN FRANCISCO |
Wed Nov 21, 2012 2:45pm EST
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Facebook Inc is proposing to combine user data with that of recently acquired photo-sharing service Instagram, and will loosen restrictions on emails between members of the social network.
Facebook also said on Wednesday it is proposing to scrap a 4-year old process that can allow the social network's roughly 1 billion users to vote on changes to its policies and terms of services.
Facebook said it may share information between its own service and other businesses or affiliates that Facebook owns to "help provide, understand, and improve our services and their own services."
One of Facebook's most significant affiliate businesses is Instagram, a photo-sharing service for smartphone users that Facebook acquired in October for roughly $715 million.
The change could open the door for Facebook to build unified profiles of its users that include people's personal data from its social network and from Instagram, similar to recent moves by Google Inc. In January, Google said it would combine users' personal information from its various Web services - such as search, email and the Google+ social network - to provide a more customized experience.
Google's unified data policy raised concerns among some privacy advocates and regulators, who said it was an invasion of people's privacy. A group of 36 U.S. state attorney generals also warned in a letter to Google that consolidating so much personal information in one place could put people at greater risk from hackers and identity thieves.
Facebook also wants to loosen the restrictions on how members of the social network can contact other members using the Facebook email system.
Facebook said it wanted to eliminate a setting for users to control who can contact them. The company said it planned to replace the "Who can send you Facebook messages" setting with new filters for managing incoming messages.
Asked whether such a change could leave Facebook users exposed to a flood of unwanted, spam-like messages, Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes said that the company carefully monitors user interaction and feedback to find ways to enhance the user experience.
"We are working on updates to Facebook Messages and have made this change in our Data Use Policy in order to allow for improvements to the product," Noyes said.
Facebook's changes come as the world's largest social networking company with roughly 1 billion users has experienced a sharp slowdown in revenue growth. The company generates the bulk of its revenue from advertising on its website.
The changes are open to public comment for the next seven days. If the proposed changes generate more than 7,000 public comments, Facebook's current terms of service automatically trigger a vote by users to approve the changes. But the vote is only binding if at least 30 percent of users take part, and two prior votes never reached that threshold.
Facebook has said in that past that it was rethinking the voting system and on Wednesday Facebook moved to eliminate the vote entirely, noting that it hasn't functioned as intended and is no longer suited to its current situation as a large publicly traded company subject to oversight by various regulatory agencies.
"We found that the voting mechanism, which is triggered by a specific number of comments, actually resulted in a system that incentivized the quantity of comments over their quality," Elliot Schrage, Facebook's vice president of communications, public policy and marketing, said in a blog post on Wednesday.
Instead of the vote, Facebook will look for other forms of user feedback on changes, such as an "Ask the Chief Privacy Officer" question-and-answer forum on its website as well as live webcasts about privacy, safety and security.
Facebook, Google and other online companies have faced increasing scrutiny and enforcement from privacy regulators as consumers entrust ever-increasing amounts of information about their personal lives to Web services.
In April, Facebook settled privacy charges with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission that it had deceived consumers and forced them to share more personal information than they intended. Under the settlement, Facebook is required to get user consent for certain changes to its privacy settings and is subject to 20 years of independent audits.
(Reporting By Alexei Oreskovic; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)
Tech
Media
Facebook
Related Quotes and News
Company
Price
Related News
Tweet this
Link this
Share this
Digg this
Email
Reprints
We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/
Comments (0)
Be the first to comment on reuters.com.
Add yours using the box above.
Edition:
U.S.
Arabic
Argentina
Brazil
Canada
China
France
Germany
India
Italy
Japan
Latin America
Mexico
Russia
Spain
United Kingdom
Back to top
Reuters.com
Business
Markets
World
Politics
Technology
Opinion
Money
Pictures
Videos
Site Index
Legal
Bankruptcy Law
California Legal
New York Legal
Securities Law
Support & Contact
Support
Corrections
Connect with Reuters
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn
RSS
Podcast
Newsletters
Mobile
About
Privacy Policy
Terms of Use
AdChoices
Copyright
Our Flagship financial information platform incorporating Reuters Insider
An ultra-low latency infrastructure for electronic trading and data distribution
A connected approach to governance, risk and compliance
Our next generation legal research platform
Our global tax workstation
Thomsonreuters.com
About Thomson Reuters
Investor Relations
Careers
Contact Us
Thomson Reuters is the world's largest international multimedia news agency, providing investing news, world news, business news, technology news, headline news, small business news, news alerts, personal finance, stock market, and mutual funds information available on Reuters.com, video, mobile, and interactive television platforms. Thomson Reuters journalists are subject to an Editorial Handbook which requires fair presentation and disclosure of relevant interests.
NYSE and AMEX quotes delayed by at least 20 minutes. Nasdaq delayed by at least 15 minutes. For a complete list of exchanges and delays, please click here.