Was a bit of hysteria called for after all?

In my Monday Globe column, I wrote (and here, at the Globe) about Facebook’s new privacy scheme – which, for many users, defaulted to settings that would have exposed their accounts to the entire Internet. I argued that the change probably wasn’t a bad thing in the long run: Facebook is a public place, and nudging users into the open helps dispel the myth that it’s a place for confidences to be kept in perpetuity.

At the time – I wrote the piece on Thursday – the announcement was pretty fresh, and I have an aversion to trashing something in print before I’ve completely got my head around it. (This might be a weakness.) But the week since – a week in which Gawker, especially, has been sounding the alarm with head-exploding abandon – has left me wondering if I was wrong to tread so lightly. And it seems increasingly clear that, while this is probably still a positive move in the long run, the way Facebook implemented it is little short of reprehensible.

The way Facebook rigged up the change, users who had previously altered their privacy settings saw their new settings default to private, too. But people who simply trusted Facebook’s default settings, which had already left them semi-exposed, were presented with default settings set to almost entirely public.

In other words, Facebook pandered to savvy users, and took advantage of the rest.

Savvy users, who had already changed their privacy settings, are the ones who have shown they know how to look after themselves. They’re the ones who have demonstrated the capacity and desire to take ownership of their accounts. (Not coincidentally, these are also the power users most likely to be the most vocal, either as Facebook members, or as bloggers, journalists, and commentators.)

The rest of the users – the as many as 70% – 80%, according to the Canadian Privacy Commissioner, who have never changed their settings – are ones who have demonstrated a willingness to follow Facebook’s lead in setting their accounts, putting an implicit trust in the company to act in their best interest.

So wouldn’t it have made more sense for Facebook to have been extra-cautious with a demonstrably trusting demographic? These are the people who have demonstrated a willingness to click ‘OK’ and follow default settings; therefore, these are the people that Facebook should be treating the most conservatively.

Instead, it took advantage of its most vulnerable members, while looking after the users who had already shown they could look after themselves. This meant that online criticism was blunted by the fact that the people who would have complained loudest were treated well. And in retrospect, that’s a side of the story that should have been aired.