Do you think marketing on social networks is a breach of privacy?

[Sunny Lam]

Marketing on social networks is not a breach of privacy unless the marketer is intentionally spamming you, tracking you and publicly displaying things you want private or preventing you from deleting or controlling the private information you provide.

If you look at the American Restatement (Second) of Torts (2010), you would have to ask yourself if the marketers were intruding on your seclusion or solitude or into your private affairs. [1]

"The central features of the tort are as follows: The defendant's conduct must be intentional; the defendant must have invaded, without lawful justification, the plaintiff's private affairs or concerns; and the invasion would be considered, by a reasonable person, to be highly offensive, causing distress or humiliation."

Is It Lawfully Justified...

Right now there are few if any laws that say that this marketing however is unjustified - which is why there are often proposals on creating these laws.

Are the Ads Highly Offensive...

If those ads were offering things and images that were based on your personal preferences and tastes then it would be hard to say that they were highly offensive, humiliating or distressing. If they weren't then that would be considered spam and wouldn't be justified.

Is Your Social Network...

A private affair or concern? Yes it could be interpreted that way by some however if you're receiving updates and your updates are also public then it may also be said that it is in fact partly or fully public and available. If you wanted it to be private then you would disable all public updates, make no public updates and make sure your friends feeds were not updated with your status updates.

When Does Advertising Cross the Line...

A prime example of where private details of your life are made public by a marketing activity is tracking your actions on others parts of the web and then publicly updating everyone in your networks without your consent.

"Facebook ran into a privacy debacle in 2007 with an advertising tool called Beacon that allowed Facebook to track users' activities on certain external sites, then show updates on the site about those activities, such as retail purchases. CEO Mark Zuckerberg later apologized to users and changed the site's privacy settings." [2]

Another major challenge is when marketers make your private information easily accessible or vulnerable to hackers. If your information is held indefinitely on a social network's or marketer's computer servers, it means that there's more time for hackers to gain access to increasing amounts of customer data.

For example, Nexopia social network was found to be in breach of privacy law in Canada:

"Edmonton-based Nexopia, which bills itself as "the place to be for teens looking to express themselves," is refusing to give users the option to permanently delete their data, despite Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart's recommendation that such an option was required to comply with Canadian law, said a news release from Stoddart's office Thursday." [3]

It's particularly problematic and can be viewed as offensive when users are not given the option to remove their personal information from a third party group that benefits from your business.

You can be sure that this is going to be a continuing challenge because it can be such a grey area and the laws just haven't caught up to the pervasiveness of marketing technology and social networks.