Mark Zuckerberg Describes a New Privacy-Centric Facebook

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2001 was not a good year for Microsoft. Its servers were ravaged by the Code Red and Nimda worms. In 2002, Bill Gates responded with his seminal 'security memo' to staff. He talked about security and trust -- that customers should be able to trust the security of Microsoft. Since then, Microsoft has made great strides on delivering this new secure model.

2018 was not a good year for Facebook. It was fined the maximum possible £500,000  by the UK's Information Commissioner for its role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal. It was described as a 'digital gangster' by a British parliamentary committee. Multiple GDPR investigations were opened by the Irish data protection regulator. And the FTC opened an investigation that is now rumored could lead to a multi-billion dollar fine. In 2019, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg responded with his own 'privacy memo'. Only history will tell whether it becomes as seminal as the Gates memo.

"In this note," says the Zuckerberg memo, "I'll outline our vision and principles around building a privacy-focused messaging and social networking platform. There's a lot to do here, and we're committed to working openly and consulting with experts across society as we develop this."

Zuckerberg outlines five areas of focus for the new privacy-centric Facebook: private interactions, encryption, reducing permanence, safety, interoperability, and secure data storage. 

In private interactions, Zuckerberg describes a distinction between broadcast messages (posts, widely available), and intimate conversations (messaging). He expects Facebook messaging to coalesce around Messenger and WhatsApp, to be protected by end-to-end encryption, and for those services to be expanded. "If this evolution is successful, interacting with your friends and family across the Facebook network will become a fundamentally more private experience."

The need for encryption is expanded in the second focus area. Encryption "limits services like ours from seeing the content flowing through them and makes it much harder for anyone else to access your information." He talks about unlawful government demands for data, and the potential for saving the lives of dissidents. But he also talks about the need to cooperate with law enforcement on the detection of "truly terrible things like child exploitation, terrorism, and extortion." He hints at improving the ability to detect bad actors by detecting patterns of activity -- which implies an increased use of algorithms. This is potentially the most difficult area for a privacy focused Facebook -- the balance between privacy and law enforcement requirements has not yet been solved.

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