A Belgian watchdog has urged all Internet users to download privacy software specifically to shield themselves from Facebook's grasp.
The social network has been under fire for the ways in which it tracks user and non-user behaviour online, without consent, most recently becoming the target of a Europe-wide lawsuit headed up by activist Max Schrems.
It was revealed in April that 25,000 people had already signed up to be a part of that lawsuit, which argues Facebook has been breaching EU data protection law. Individual regulators have been investigating whether or not this is the case for years, and in April Facebook confessed to tracking non-users using cookies (something for which consent must be sought if related to advertising, according to EU law). The social network blamed it on a bug.
That admission only came about when the same watchdog, the Belgian Privacy Commission (BPC), revealed it in an earlier report, the findings of which its current recommendations have been based upon. The report also found that Facebook tracked anyone that uses the "Like" button via social plugins, available on an estimated 13 million sites, and the site tracks users that have logged out of the social network.
