So, everyone's excited about the new Facebook Places, right? The Facebook service that lets you check-in, Foursquare style, at whatever hip Sushi bar/bicycle repair shop you happen to be in. Oh, and also other people can check you in, too.
Facebook places, which rolls out this evening, allows your friends (and only your friends) to tag you when checking into a place, much as they might tag you in a picture. This is terrible! Of course, you are notified whenever anyone tags you in a check-in, and you can always delete a tag. But, still. You're probably not checking in because either 1) You don't want people to know where you are. Or 2) You spent all your money on Star Wars memorabilia and can't afford a smartphone, so you won't see that someone's tagged you until you get home anyway.
Why to do It
Here are a couple situations off the top of our head where someone else tagging you could bring social doom:
- You are at the bar when you are supposed to be at your girlfriend's crappy art show. Your chat with your friend Jane, who checks into the bar and tags you: "At this awesome bar, just talked to [Your name here] about his Star Wars memorabilia collection!" Your girlfriend sees this on Jane's wall, walks over to the bar and dumps you on the spot.
- You are having an affair with your wife's sister. Your wife's sister checks into her home and says "Having awesome sex with [Your name here]". Your wife sees this on her sister's wall and divorces you. (Also, a robber you're friends with steals your Star Wars memorabilia collection because he knows you're out having the affair.)
That second one is not very probable, but you get the point!
At the Facebook places launch event, an engineer equated tagging someone in a check-in with tagging someone in a picture. Not quite the same thing. Someone has to point a thing at you and take your picture. But anyone can go to the bathroom, tag you in a check-in, then a significant other/spouse/boss/stranger sees it and: Boom. Your life is ruined. A picture does not automatically tell someone exactly where you are, with whom, when, and whether you are having an awesome time, despite the fact that you should be at your girlfriend's terrible art opening.
How to do it
Here's how to make sure other people can't tag you on Places. Plus, how to adjust the two other Places privacy settings. First, click on the Account tab at the top right and click Privacy Settings. Select the little blue "customize settings" towards the bottom of the screen that appears.
You'll see a list of privacy options. Under the Things Others Share category, disable "Friends can check me in to Places." Now, only you can broadcast your location.
You can also choose who can see your check-ins. Click the "Places I check in" pulldown under the Things I Share category. The default is "friends only." Selecting "Customize" brings up a pop-up where you can exclude entire networks, individual people, or everyone.
Finally, you may want to disable the "People Here Now" feature. "People Here Now" allows any user checked in at a location to see who else is checked in there—even if they're not friends. Make sure the box is unchecked next to "Include me in 'People Here Now' after I check in."
There. Your Star Wars memorabilia collection is safe and you are ready to sneak around like the sexy Russian spy you may or may not be. Now if only there was a big button that could easily disable the whole damn thing.
Send an email to Adrian Chen, the author of this post, at adrian@gawker.com.
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Hmm, is "People Here Now" such a bad thing? Isn't the whole point of "checking in" somewhere so that your friends can see you're there? Is there any function that lets you just check in visible to friends only (is that the default if you don't check People Here Now?), or is it Everyone or no one? My head hurts.
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I logged into my wife's FB to change these settings, but there is no "Custom" option in the Privacy Settings page. The last one on her list is "Recommended" and that's it. Is that normal? (I don't use FB other than to tweak her settings like this).
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sorry, dumb question: do you have to physically be somewhere to check in, or just say that you're there? I've never used foursquare, I have no idea. because, hell, I'll start checking in from all over the globe !!!
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this kinda sounds like grindr but for everyone?
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Or Jane could POST to her FB saying she talked to you at the bar, and you'd get your ass in trouble later. Then there's the people who say "I'm going to x location with x person at x time today" ... and that is any different?
And if you don't know how to use your privacy settings there's a good possibility you should not be on the internet.
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So, how is this different than someone posting a simple text update that says, "At the bar with John Doe," and then everyone just assuming John Doe was in fact at the bar? It doesn't seem any different from a liability perspective to me because it's still essentially hearsay. Basically, unless there is a way for you to PROVE that the person was there, like maybe tagging them in a photo (ignoring photoshop), then essentially any update, text or geographical is limited to how much you believe the person making the post. I don't get why this is so heinous. Now, being able to tag people in photos is a whole 'nother story.
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I don't know why FB doesn't require the tagged person (for pics or places) to approve the tag before it's made public! That would make everything much simpler.
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So this is kind of like Gawker Stalker Maps for the rest of us? Wasn't it benign when Gawker did this to celebs?
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This sounds like the crazy drama-queen stalker's godsend. Seriously, you could get any boyfriend/friend/sibling in trouble at any time, since you don't really have to PROVE the person you're tagging is actually with you wherever you are...
Not that I plan on using this device for evil... unless I am provoked.
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Again, I mention that Gawker is just as guilty of installing an app on Gawker users' FB pages without our knowledge or consent, which has never been formally addressed on the site. Just sayin'.
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I'm standing right behind you. Nice dress
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big brother is on the scene and he is us
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orrrrr...just don't have a facebook account.
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First thing I did this morning was disable all this nonsense.
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Does it have mayorships like foursquare? Are there any benefits of being a facebook "mayor" if there are? Are points and badges and shit awarded for different types of check ins? Haven't used it yet obv, but this sounds like a dumbed down, creepier version of foursquare. I'll pass.
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Oh man, thank gods the dude I'm sleeping with doesn't use facebook.
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What's the big deal? People will probably just end up fake tagging people as jokes. I mean, whats to say you were really there at all? This is so.. amazingly boring
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There's one other place people may want to change their Facebook privacy settings in regards to the new Places feature. As stated on Facebook, this is the area you "Control what information is available to applications and websites when your friends use them." On the Facebook website, go to Account -- Privacy Settings -- near the bottom left corner find "Applications and Websites" and click on Edit your settings -- find "Info accessible through your friends" and click on Edit Settings -- uncheck "Places I've visited".
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This article makes it sound like the only reason to avoid being place-tagged is to avoid the consequences of your shady actions. That's kind of ridiculous. The biggest reason, to me, is to avoid broadcasting where you are at all times, which can have a ton of unintended consequences. The world is a bad place sometimes, and telling teh interwebz that you're not at home is a good invitation to criminals to break into your home, for example.
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Thanks for this article! I thought I had disabled the "Friends can check me in" last night, but I was too busy playing with my ewok village that I did it wrong. Forwarded this to my coworkers as well.
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Hrm... interested to see what this does to FourSquare's marketshare...
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Here's how to prevent others from tagging you: 1) Don't get a Facebook account
2) There is no step 2!
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I think it's time to leave Facebook. This shit is crazy. There are so many things wrong with this, we can't possibly imagine all of the bad shit that could come of this. Allowing other people to track your location at any time without your knowledge is just so so stupid.
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Or, you know, you could not lie to people as a general policy and therefore not have to worry about being fired/dumped/divorced because of being tagged on facebook.
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