A couple of days ago I received a Facebook notification message on my smartphone, so I opened the FB app. After realizing it was a private message, I clicked on the "messages" icon at the bottom of my screen, only to find the following warning (image at right). Hmmm. Simple enough, right? All I had to do was click the blue install button, download the app and then read the message in this new and I assumed, improved feature. What harm could there be in that?
Well, plenty, according to the experts. In the terms of service agreement (that you must agree to before installation), is some rather invasive language that will probably SHOCK you as it did me. I'd heard some horror stories about installing this app but I wondered how truly onerus it could be? Facebook already had far too much information, so what more could they garner from the installation of this little application? Surely the fear mongering about Facebook being able to turn on my camera while my phone is idle, has to be bogus. Or being able to monitor my location through my smartphone's GPS... oh come on, that's the kind of stuff from the Hunger Games.
Well, not so fast! First play the short video (below) specifically targeting the privacy dangers of Facebook Messenger, and then watch the one to follow which deals primarily with some banking apps and their similar attempts to invade our world. I can assure you that this is a very real threat.
My advice? If you've already installed any of these apps (Messenger, Bank of America, Capital One), uninstall them immediately! I surely can live without the Facebook Messenger app since I still have access to it through my phone's browser and on my computer.
Hopefully this will send a clear and decisive message to these power-crazed corporations and to others that may be charting a similar course. This kind of corporate fascism is insidious and I think it must be rebuffed.
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