The is some kind of disconnect happening here. The tone and content of many comments here reflect an attitude that it's a given that FB having data about, anything, is bad. (Not universally in this comment thread, there are some dissenting views, but I'm reference what I see as the general rhetorical tone.)

My guess is that your average civilian does not view the fact that FB is acquiring vast amounts of data about them, and their social networks, as an a priori "bad thing."

I do hear non tech people make comments that the targeted advertising is creepy. But I doubt many people lose any sleep over this, let alone take dramatic action, like "quitting social media."

So, if one is concerned, on a civic level, that the growing datasets of personal information is a genuine threat to some particular community, and one wanted to act against it, the most important action would be to develop, and share, persuasive arguments to support this point of view.

I do not see such arguments being made. That can persuade an average person that all of this personal data being collected is going to hurt them and/or their community.

On the contrary, there is ever increasing participation in social networking. Many people do not crave privacy: they crave an opposing instinct, which is to be known, and to know about others. A lot of others.

The amount of personal information being actively shared, to as wide of an audience as possible so, on YouTube is astonishing.

In the proverbial "real world" the most dramatic and obvious potential for "cyber-hsrms" are the result of criminal activity.

When is comes to actual and potential threats to individuals and organizations well being, the second largest institutional force would be government. So far, for US citizens, the government has not been causing disproportionate harms from the IT realm, as compared to benefits.

On the other hand, If you were a peasant maimed in an incident of "collateral damage," from a US drone strike, the real world, personal, harm would be immense.

When it comes to the corporate realm, there is a financial-military-intelligence-political complex that is a far greater threat to everyone's life and liberty than FB.

At root, the business of FB is about making connections and sharing information, There are two main realms of activity, which symbiotically support each other. That is, the social realm, and the commerce realm.

These are essentially constructive activities.

There really is a need for companies to market their wares effectively, and FB have created a viable platform to do so.

The value of FB is not just all the user created data. A lot of work and resources go into the technical, marketing, and managerial challenges of building such a company. For many people, trading their personal data to get the social benefits is a "no-brainer."

Personally, I prefer the tracked advertising, as it actually is far more relevant to my interests. I often find interesting products and services, that I might never have otherwise found.

I can certainly imagine scenarios where the hegemony over mass personal information datasets, held by the big tech companies, does in fact lead to objectively bad outcomes for the users of these social networks.

Where I see the biggest threat,that derives from sharing so much personal data with a company like FB, actually relates to the threatening activities of the two large social forces I meantioned above, the government, and criminals.

The government, especially in the US, has vast resources, as well as the exclusive monopoly on legal violence. if it was decided by the executive or legislative branches that it was absolutely essential that Facebook turn over all their data to the intelligence agencies, due to the need to crack down on dissent, social unrest, then, yes this could be bad.

Obviously, if hackers managed do to breach some of these massive datasets, then there could be some very damaging effects.

It's interesting to note that so far FB and Google haven't suffered massive data breaches.

Fundamentally, a company like Facebook does not want to do its users harm. They actively resist efforts by both the government and hackers to get their hands on these datasets.

I am very curious to hear if anyone has articulated a narrative by which the "dark side" of of the big data companies actually starts to cause harm to people. (I mean in a statistically significant way. There are bad outcomes for people that relate to the social network companies, but these tend to one-off."