Napster Co-Founder Steals Facebook Users' Data For Blackmail-like Business Model

Jerk.com exceeded the promise implicit in its name. A better moniker would have been www.LyingStealingExploiting.com, according to the charges detailed by the Federal Trade Commission in its href="http://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/cases/140407jerkpart3cmpt.pdf">complaint.

On April 2nd the FTC sued Jerk.com for telling consumers that users created the profiles on the site, when really, Jerk.com had scraped information from Facebook FB user pages to create most of the profiles on Jerk.com. The details in the FTC complaint are chilling.

Facebook users who posted information using privacy settings that should have kept their information and pictures safe discovered instead that the world could see them on Jerk.com. Adding insult to the injury, they probably discovered they were labelled "jerks".

Worst of all, parents discovered pictures of their kids. According to the FTC complaint: "An estimated 2.7 to 6.8 million Jerk profiles contained a photo of a child who appeared to be under age 10. Some photos featured intimate family moments, including children bathing and a mother nursing her child."

Who would take private information and publicize it this way? Napster co-founder John Fanning.

Blackmail-Like Business Model

Jerk.com profited by charging people $30 for the right to dispute the information posted about them. Heck, Jerk.com even charged to contact them by email--a stiff $25 for that privilege.

But no fee could sway Jerk.com to take a profile down. The complaint quoted the website:

"No one's profile is ever removed because Jerk is based on searching free open internet, searching databases and it's not possible to remove things from the Internet. You can however use Jerk to manage your reputation and resolve disputes with people who you are in conflict with."

In short, the business model appears to have been: freak people out by publishing information about them that they thought was private, charge them for the right to do damage control, and charge them for the right to give Jerk.com a piece of their minds. Or even just to ask for help.

Will Facebook Sue?

Jerk.com was able to scrape and use the Facebook data because it signed up to be a Facebook developer. How frightened should Facebook users be that other developers will seek to publicly exploit them this way in the future?

Here's what the FTC said about the access Facebook developers get:

"Facebook permits third-party developers to integrate websites and applications with Facebook. Developers can access data for all Facebook users through Facebook's application programming interfaces (“APIs”), which provide sets of tools developers can use to interact with Facebook. Developers that use the Facebook platform must agree to Facebook's policies".

That sounds like all developers get an all-access pass simply by promising to be good. If Facebook wants its users to feel safe, then,it must force promise-breakers to pay.

Facebook has not yet posted comment to Boston.comthat it took breaches of its terms of seriously and would work with the FTC. If working with the FTC is the total Facebook response to breaches of its terms, however, how comfortable should users really be?