Brandon Turbeville

Activist Post

As if the current methods of evaporating privacy and pushing a world toward the Cashless Society were not moving fast enough, Facebook is now developing and beta testing an app that would allow users to “pay their utility bills, balance their checkbooks, and transfer money at the same time they upload vacation photos to the site for friends to see.”

Essentially, the new application which is currently in beta phase with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, allows for interactions regarding banking and financial services over alleged secure and private connections.

A similar, albeit attenuated program, is already in existence in India which was created by ICICI Bank in conjunction with Facebook that allows users, “through a secure SSL connection,” to “view account details and mini statements as well as apply for debit cards and request chequebooks.”

See the ICICI Bank Facebook App Demo Video here.

Indeed, KeyPoint Credit Union also has its own Facebook app that allows for many of the same features including the user’s ability to access all of their KeyPoint accounts via the app.

Facebook is obviously known for many things – but none of them are its respect for privacy. In fact, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been very open about his disdain for even the concept of privacy, stating openly that he simply doesn’t believe in it.

Still, both Facebook and the participants in this emerging app are assuring future customers that there is no need for concern regarding leakage of personal data. Commonwealth Bank, for instance, holds that it will not launch the program without a 100% guarantee of security.

With this in mind and, given the track record as well as the open declarations of disregard for privacy by Facebook and its directors, would anyone in their right minds trust their online banking and financial information to the social networking giant?

Unfortunately, the answer is likely to be a resounding “Yes.”

Regardless of the stampede toward yet another privacy-destroying program, Ana Kasparian of The Young Turks accurately summed up some of the concerns regarding online banking privacy and the new Facebook app during a recent TYT broadcast. She said;

And I’ll tell you what my conspiracy theory is. Facebook makes money by selling ads. And the way that they sell ads is by telling the advertisers what their users are spending their money on. If they have the ability to see what you’re spending your money on via BillPay, on their website, then they’re going to sell that information to a third party. And then they’re going to be like ‘What? What privacy? What are you talking about?’

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Kasparian should give herself more credit. Her deductions are merely logic based on previous experiences and the historical behavior of Facebook – not conspiracy theories.