Facebook to users: Kiss your privacy good-bye

Facebook users, beware -- you now have no privacy. The social networking site has implemented a controversial technology that publishes an astonishing amount of private information about you, including movies you watch, products you buy, and even holiday-buying lists.

The new technology is called Beacon, and it publishes information to your friends about your purchases at a variety of Web sites, including the movie ticket site Fandango, the bargain site Outlet.com, the shoe-buying site Zappos.com, and many others.

I accidentally came across the new technology this past weekend when I bought a ticket at Fandango, and was alerted that information was going to be shared with all of my Facebook friends.

Beacon is causing a furor among Facebook users and privacy advocates. There's now a Facebook group called Petition: Facebook, stop invading my privacy! that has already amassed tens of thousands of members. The activist group Moveon.org is also protesting the privacy invasion, and has an online petition against it.

There's no global way to opt out of Beacon. Facebook claims that you can opt out on a site-by-site basis, but the notice on the site about it is so small, you'll likely never see it. I never saw it on Fandango, for example.

Facebook should back down on this one --- this is one of the worst instances of privacy invasion the Web has seen. Ultimately, it's going to come back and bite Facebook. People will simply move to another social networking site, rather than have their personal lives laid bare.