Facebook’s Growing Issue of Transparency

This is part one of a series on Transparency. Read part two.

Facebook has often revised its policies around privacy.

A Reuters article published almost seven years ago quoted a company spokesperson as justifying a new policy allowing posts to be viewable to everyone, including non-friends, because “sharing of information is consistent with the way the world is moving.”

Fast forward to today, after years of privacy policy changes at Facebook, the company’s ongoing issue reflects a decline in the company’s clarity in their policy protection and transparency.

However, sharing information and true organizational transparency are not the same.

Why is transparency so important?

If a business is too transparent with their data, their competitive advantage could be compromised.  And for a nonprofit, how well it is serving its constituents is a matter of interpretation, and sharing who its donors are may not be in the nonprofit’s best interest.

The balance between too much and not enough information centers around values.

Do they provide information to satisfy a ruling or policy, or is it part of the values by which an organization was formed?

Now, Facebook is back in the news this time from accusations the team in charge of news feeds routinely suppresses the conservative point of view. How is this bias possible when we the users assume our news feed is a product of a digital algorithm?

According to Facebook, a team is responsible for monitoring the data and the algorithm. The New York Times states Facebook should undergo investigation.

Media is known to be biased, so what’s the big deal?

Bias in and of itself is part of the culture of news reporting. Though a plethora of media outlets are quite frank about their positions, the problem with Facebook is the lack of transparency with their billion users.

Now, I turn the question of transparency over to you. With Facebook being the most global platform in the world, its growing issue of transparency should concern a majority of its users all over the world.

Does Facebook’s lack of transparency bother you? Comment below your thoughts.