Originally Posted by d-null

http://www.torontosun.com/news/canad.../14593546.html

A Canadian law firm launched a class-action lawsuit against Facebook Friday afternoon, alleging the social networking giant was profiting from people's personal information.

Merchant was referring to a series of 2009 changes to Facebook's privacy policy that automatically set a variety of information ? such as names, friends lists and profile pictures ? to public as the default setting.

That meant information that may have once been visible only to friends and family became public, unless a user went into their settings and specifically marked it as private.

Those settings have been criticized for being difficult to find and comprehend.

As well, Facebook makes public information available to third-party clients, who then use it for targeted advertising.

Merchant said users were not made aware of these changes, and as a result, Facebook is making money off people's private data. Those people deserve a piece of that profit, he argued.