Facebook Cares About Privacy, with 1 Big Catch

Luke Barnes

Technology,

Unless it involves the company's new cryptocurrency, then it'll give your data to the cops.

Facebook cares about privacy. Or at least is says it does.

After two-and-a-half years bouncing from one scandal and misstep to another (most notably with Cambridge Analytica, where Facebook’s lax attitude towards user privacy led to nearly 100 million users’ personal information being mined by a dodgy pro-Trump data firm), Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in March that the company would be pivoting to a more privacy-orientated vision.

“I believe the future of communication will increasingly shift to private, encrypted services where people can be confident what they say to each other stays secure and their messages and content won’t stick around forever,” Zuckerberg said in a lengthy blog post. “This is the future I hope we will help bring about”

But this focus on privacy doesn’t seem to extend to Libra, Facebook’s newly minted cryptocurrency which is scheduled to launch next year. As the Wall Street Journalreported on Tuesday, testimony by Facebook executive David Marcus earlier in the month made it clear that Libra could stand out among cryptocurrencies in being a tool for law enforcement, because it would have a clearer transaction and ownership record then most of its current rivals.

“You’re going to see an expansion of exchanges and wallet services that have stronger (anti-money-laundering) protocols and restrictions,” former CIA analyst Yaya Fanusie told the Journal. “That would be good for law enforcement.”