News: Facebook applications stealing user info

According to the Wall Street Journal, certain third-party controlled Facebook applications (such as Farmville and Mafia Wars), are sharing users info with outside parties, something which is against Facebook's privacy policy.

The report indicates that “tens of millions” of users could be affected, and that the privacy sharing is mostly thanks to applications created by mobile game developers, Zynga, which includes the mega popular Farmville.

The leaked information includes Facebook user ID's which advertising agencies and other tracking firms can utilise to find user's names and other information on the sprawling social network.

And even users who didn't jump on the Zynga bandwagon are at risk since the security breach allows third party companies to view the full friend's lists of all their users who did agree to install the software. This means that if even one of your friends plays Farmville, they have access to information about you.

According to the company's policies, Facebook doesn't allow application developers to transfer information about users to outside advertising firms, even if a user agrees.

Facebook has not yet responded to comment regarding the matter, in the meantime, just be wary of what you allow on Facebook and what you don't.

Facebook applications stealing user info

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