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Doing the social splits with Facebook

| March 31, 2018 1:00 AM

Three years ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook spoke during a conference at Stanford University.

Perhaps he knew, or guessed, what was about to happen in the technology industry.

In any case, he became a frighteningly accurate prophet of doom.

“If those of us in a position of responsibility don’t do anything to protect every right of privacy,” Cook said, “we risk losing something far more valuable than money.

“We lose our way of life.”

Yes.

And here we are.

The omnipresent Facebook, which 44 million Americans say is their No. 1 source for news, stands accused of monstrous sins in its use of members’ personal information.

Facebook hasn’t even bothered to deny that it sold the private information of 50 million users to Cambridge Analytica, a London-based company with dark plans for all that data.

Cambridge Analytica used Facebook’s input — along with some other tricks — to influence the 2016 U.S. election and the monumental vote called Brexit that pushed Britain out of the European Union.

Now Facebook is being lashed by the European Court of Justice, and here in the States, founder Mark Zuckerberg is being summoned to testify at various hearings — including what could be a serious confrontation at the Federal Trade Commission.

Quick aside: In an interview with MSNBC that has yet to be aired, Apple’s Cook was asked what he’d do now if he were in Zuckerberg’s position.

Cook’s response: “I wouldn’t be in that position.”

There is no question that Facebook has played fast and loose, turning its customers into profit centers.

Every time you chatted with Aunt Alice about the best shower curtains, you were adding another scrap of data for Facebook to peddle.

It’s reprehensible, really.

And yet …

Although 91 percent of respondents to a Pew Research Center survey condemned Facebook’s activities, most admitted that they might not abandon the social media giant.

WE JUST like it too much.

Elizabeth Cohen, a communications professor at West Virginia University, points out a couple of reasons why we’ll all gasp at Facebook’s behavior — but go right on using the platform.

The first key word is “social,” Cohen said, noting that most of us use Facebook to stay connected with friends we don’t see on a regular basis.

Besides, Cohen noted, abandoning Facebook won’t save your privacy.

Plenty more internet actors will happily sell your information — most of which is all over the place by now.

It was difficult deciding what to do with the Facebook links to this column because, heck, we’ve had a lot of fun with it.

There was even a second dilemma, since I have a personal Facebook account under my own name — and Facebook has been my connection to pals I met while living and working in Britain, Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere.

In the end, I freely admit to picking both possible courses of action here.

I’m severing ties with Facebook for “A Brand New Day,” for the obvious moral and ethical reasons.

This column is tied to the newspaper and to you as readers, so I feel obligated to reach for the high ground.

Meantime, I’ll keep my personal account open — admitting Facebook’s faults with a grimace and looking the other way.

That call is on me alone.

The Facebook account linked to this column will close on April 3, but please keep emailing, and reach out to me on Twitter (@BrandNewDayCDA).

Oh, and if I see a “friend request” from any of you characters on my personal account …

Here’s a hug.

Welcome!

•••

Steve Cameron is a columnist for The Press.

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

Twitter: @BrandNewDayCDA