Facebook Private Messages on Timeline Scare – How did it Garner so much Panic?

Last week I posted an article on the rumour that Facebook users private inbox messages were being published on their timelines. As the Internet community slowly comes to terms with the fact that this turned out to be nothing more than a scare – not a privacy breach – I discuss how this hoax managed to garner so much viral panic.

I would recommend reading this article from top to bottom, a couple of times, before thinking about making a comment. I will tell you now that comments made by people who have not understood or read this article will not be published.

A privacy watchdog has concluded a week long investigation into the privacy scare claims and has concluded no breach has occurred. And when the privacy watchdogs side with Facebook, it is unquestionably the time to chalk this up to rumour!

I reported that – despite the resolve of many users – the rumours were likely to be false. Not without investigation of course, but when an apparent privacy breach occurs affecting a possible 900 million users, and not one single person, technology blog, privacy watchdog or Facebook themselves can provide a single piece of irrefutable proof that a breach did in fact occur, then something isn’t right. Right? Also, it is not realistic that Facebook could cover up a privacy breach that has allegedly affected so many of its users.

In this case, Facebook were not entirely to blame

So why did so many Facebook users become so absolutely convinced that they were indeed seeing old private messages posted on their timeline?

Now I believe that for many (not all) Facebook users it is simply a case not remembering both how we made posts & messages and how we treated Facebook all those years ago. We’re talking about posts made about 5 or 6 years ago

In a time where we were much more cavalier with our personal information than we are now.

On a brand new social platform that also was very different than it is today.

On an Internet that did not prioritise privacy the way it does now.

I also believe that because of this, users have been duped by some behavioural, social trickery that this rumour seems to naturally elicit that has helped it become as viral as it has.

You see, if a user were to delve into their archaic wall posts on their own accord, without hearing this rumour, then when they came across wall posts that contained a little too much private information, then they may shrug, question why they [or a friend] posted it and hide it from their timeline, not giving it a second thought.

But if you rewind, and that same Facebook user delves into their wall posts after hearing this panicked, breathless alarmist rumour, and they come across that same message, then their conclusions alter dramatically. It all seems to fit into place and that wall post must have been a private message, and thus a privacy breach must have occurred.

Also, conformism will increase this reaction ten-fold. Rewind again and that same user is given the same alarmist rumour and has several friends claiming they too have seen private messages published on their timeline. Upon delving into their wall posts and they see that same wall post, their reaction and conclusion is practically a forgone conclusion. It has happened to them too, and without doubt a privacy breach has occurred.

You can find the same psychology behind many different social networking rumours.

With that said, I also don’t believe that hazy memories and social trickery is the only reason this rumour has gone viral. I do believe that there is another aspect that has caused this confusion and that lays specifically with the Facebook platform itself, and how much it has changed over the last 6 years.
How we communicated on Facebook was completely different back in 2007/08 and we also have to consider that at this time most of us were new to Facebook. Back then comments and likes were non-existent, and thus we swapped wall posts back and forth much like we would send and receive private inbox messages. This, coupled with the passage of time, is the reason why many users were left sure that those messages were sent as private messages.

And I don’t blame Facebook users for this confusion either. Back then swapping wall posts really was like sending private messages. It is because how we used Facebook back then, not just on a social who-cares-about-privacy level, but how we actually navigated and used the site, was completely different compared with today.

Also consider how fast wall posts back then became essentially hidden, quickly pushed out of view with the constant introduction of fresher information on Facebook’s older layered format. The transient appearance of such wall posts back then added to the illusion that these posts were actually private.

But now the timeline has opened up these archaic, lost, previously-almost-irretrievable posts of years yonder with a few clicks of a mouse. Posts that users assumed were private because of their fleeting appearance in their memories. And the natural assumption is that the messages were actually inbox messages. But they never were.

And even though no privacy breach has occurred, Facebook are not totally without blame here. The timeline has opened up our history with a few clicks of a mouse – and considering how we all treated our privacy back then – it was inevitable that many of their users were going to have posts from “yester-years” that they didn’t want opened up to the world today. And despite Facebook’s and our insistence to check your new timeline for problematic posts when it was first released to the public, it is unrealistic to expect all Facebook users to do this. Perhaps Facebook should have “defaulted” all older posts to “only me” to help prevent this problem.

So, even though no privacy breach has occurred, it is still advisable to trawl through those ancient postings and get rid of anything you don’t want your friends seeing. If there is one thing this whole fiasco has taught us, it’s that privacy breach or no privacy breach, back in 2007 we were posting stuff we shouldn’t have been.

Did you or your friends fall for this rumour? Or do you still believe it? Did you find wall posts worth deleting? Let us know.

References –
PCAdvisor.co.uk – French privacy watchdog dismisses reports of Facebook bug
Huffington Post Article – updated to reflect Facebook’s denial.
TechCrunch: Update: Facebook Confirms No Private Messages Appearing On Timeline. They’re Old Wall Posts.