Facebook Changes Privacy Settings to Enable Facial Recognition

By NICK BILTON
Facebook automatically turned on facial recognition for its users but it can be disabled in the privacy settings on the Web site.
Facebook is pushing the privacy line once again, according to a new report from a security and antivirus company.
According to the report, from Sophos, Facebook recently began changing its users’ privacy settings to automatically turn on a facial recognition feature that detects a user’s face in an image. Once the person’s face is detected, the Web site then encourages Facebook friends to tag them. Facebook introduced this feature last year for its North American users; it is now rolling it out globally.
Facebook also doesn’t give users the option to avoid being tagged in a photo; instead, people who don’t want their name attached to an image must untag themselves after the fact.
In response to a reporter’s inquiry, posted on a Facebook blog, the company said, “We should have been more clear with people during the roll-out process when this became available to them.”
The post continued: “We launched Tag Suggestions to help people add tags of their friends in photos; something that’s currently done more than 100 million times a day.  Tag Suggestions are only made to people when they add new photos to the site, and only friends are suggested. If for any reason someone doesn’t want their name to be suggested, they can disable the feature in their Privacy Settings.”
You can change the privacy settings relating to the facial recognition feature, but it is a little confusing. If you want to disable the feature, go your account privacy settings and click “customize settings” at the bottom of the page. Once in this area, scroll down to a list of options called “things others share,” and then click on the button that says “suggest photos of me to friends.” You will then be given the option to disable the facial recognition feature.
Facebook has come under repeated criticism in the past few years for automatically opting users into new product releases without their knowledge or consent. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder and chief executive, has defended this decision in the past, noting that most users would not experience the full effects of Facebook without the new features that are continuously rolled out.
Privacy experts and some Facebook users disagree, saying the company should introduce new products by asking users if they would like to join, rather than automatically signing them up without their knowledge.

source : http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/07/facebook-changes-privacy-settings-to-enable-facial-recognition/?smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto

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Microsoft, Facebook Back AT&T’s T-Mobile Deal; Google Remains Silent

    * By Sam Gustin

Wireless giant AT&T has friends in high places — and not just on Capitol Hill.
Several major technology companies including Microsoft, Yahoo, Oracle, Facebook and Research In Motion, which makes the BlackBerry line of devices, have thrown their weight behind AT&T’s proposed $39 billion merger with T-Mobile. So have two of the most powerful venture capital firms in the country: Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Partners.
The tech companies and VC firms expressed their support of the deal, which is being scrutinized by the Federal Communications Commission and the Justice Department, in letters filed with the FCC late Monday, The New York Times reported.
Their support constitutes a powerful endorsement from some of the heaviest hitters in Silicon Valley, and is no doubt warmly received by AT&T public policy chief Jim Cicconi, who last week characterized support for the merger as, “perhaps the broadest, deepest range of public-interest support ever filed at the FCC in support of any transaction.”
Support for the merger is not unanimous in Silicon Valley, however. In fact, one extremely important Valley company is remaining conspicuously silent on the deal: Google. A spokesperson for the web search titan confirmed Tuesday that the company has not taken a position on the merger, but declined to comment further. Tech giant Apple, which did not return a request for comment, is also staying mum on the deal.
Critics of the merger, most notably Sprint, the number three wireless company, argue that reducing the number of nationwide mobile providers from four to three would concentrate too much market power in the hands of AT&T and Verizon, which would control 80 percent of the market. The companies could use this market power to raise prices for consumers or muscle out smaller competitors, especially regional carriers.
Allowing the merger to proceed, critics say, would result in a return to a “1980’s-style” duopoly that would stifle innovation and competition in the wireless market.


For more read :  http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/06/microsoft-facebook-att/

Skype’s problems keep adding up, will prove a challenge for Microsoft

June 7, 2011 | Sean Ludwig

 

Early on Tuesday, popular internet chat service Skype experienced a significant outage, with a large number of users not being able to sign in or make calls with the service. Millions of users were affected by the outage, according to PCWorld. On its latest blog update, Skype said today’s problems had stabilized and “recovery was ongoing.”
“Skype should return to normal soon,” wrote Skype blogger Peter Parkes. “If you were disconnected from Skype earlier, you shouldn’t need to manually sign back in to Skype — it should reconnect automatically when it’s able to do so. We apologise for the disruption to your conversations.”
Skype has more than 170 million users, so many customers were unaffected. VentureBeat staff in New York and Nashville had minor Skype calling problems earlier today, but the difficulties have subsided.
The issues come only weeks after a similar outage. On May 26, Skype released an update to its Windows version to fix what it labeled “a corruption.” The day after, the company updated its Mac software for the same problem.
On top of having two large outages in two weeks, a Russian hacker claimed last week to have reverse-engineered part of Skype’s protocol and posted his results on the Web. In response, Skype told InformationWeek: “We are taking all necessary steps to prevent/defeat nefarious attempts to subvert Skype’s experience. Skype takes its users’ safety and security seriously and we work tirelessly to ensure each individual has the best possible experience.”
These are not small problems, and they will soon be Microsoft’s to deal with. Microsoft acquired Skype back on May 10 for $8.5 billion in cash, which was Microsoft’s largest acquisition ever. The deal signified that Microsoft would make video chat a priority in its operations and will likely see Skype integrated into Xbox 360, Kinect, Windows Phone, and Outlook.
Microsoft is not yet involved with Skype’s operations, as the deal is subject to regulatory review. Both Microsoft and Skype expect clearance for the deal by the end of 2011.
When Microsoft gets its hands on Skype, it’s got work to do. Cleaning up the service to stop regular outages, preventing hackers from making Skype protocol open source, and expanding the scope of video chat in some of the most widely used programs in the world will all be important.
Personally, I hope Microsoft takes Skype seriously and expands the reach and accessibility of video chat. I want to see the technology-enhanced future that’s depicted in movies like Star Trek and Minority Report in my living room. But first, it will need to improve the service’s stability and make using Skype a fun rather than frustrating experience.