BY: Russell Spruill
Facebook already has access to some of your most precious memories, online habits, whereabouts, and daily tasks you choose to share. What’s next? Your credit card information. When Facebook stock began to fall, they needed a way to please disgruntled investors. Over the past month, Facebook has implemented a new app that allows you to purchase things such as chocolate, coffee, socks, and other real-life presents and send them to friends and family while the company takes a cut as revenue. Users are able to click a “gift” icon seen on a friend’s page or purchase a gift when the birthday notification shows up. Not only must the purchaser provide credit card information and billing address, but they must provide the recipient’s address as well.
Some people may not find much of a difference between this and the usual online shopping done on retail store’s websites. The major difference between the two is security. We’ve all seen, and possibly fallen for, the Facebook links that contain viruses, or allow your profile to be “hacked”. What protects this app from hackers attempting to steal personal information? For us who know better than to trust things on Facebook, it’s an easy decision to steer clear of putting our credit card on there; but what about our parents, or aunts and uncles who aren’t as familiar with the annoying Facebook hacking?
I definitely agree. Facebook is interesting in the sense that it provides a very valuable service, but does not have a clear business model, and know one really knows where their money comes from. In lieu of this they have tried to come up with some agressive ways to become more profitable, but they are by no means a vendor of any sort. I would recommend that one tries to give fb as little information as possible, because their security is definitely compromised.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with McCants. Facebook has not reach that point where they are successful with their security.
ReplyDeleteThis may be a good idea for those who invest in facebook, but this will surely show itself as a very bad idea. Giving facebook my address and someone else's address just will not happen. And I definitely do not see why anyone would consider giving their credit card information to facebook. This sounds like the beginning of facebook and some major identity theft.
ReplyDeleteIt will be interesting to see how Facebook will further develop this concept. Social Commerce has been an increasingly popular method for monetizing social media marketing. Fashion-tech startups such as Polyvore, Pinterest, and Svpply has taken advantage of Social Commerce through providing a rich community atmosphere in which brands can market through. Facebook being one of the largest social media platforms should take advantage of their rich database to drive traffic into consumer sales and lead generation.
ReplyDeleteSocial media is a love/hate street due to all the information people put out there about themselves but the information you have to submit to play. Taking to heart "it's only fun when everyone plays," Facebook has slowly been becoming more lenient on what it allows people who aren't your friends to see, is it for money-making purposes?
ReplyDeleteTo Mr. McCants' point, Facebook has a lot of data but doesn't necessarily have a direct revenue stream (i.e. they aren't literally making money from you posting a status). Facebook (FB:NASDAQ) shares bounced off of their lows earlier this autumn in the mid 17s. It'll be interesting to see how this one plays out.
Facebook is going to have to brainstorm some new ways to keep their investors happy especially with Twitter taking over. But I do not trust having my credit card information on Facebook. In the internet world anything and everything can be hacked.
ReplyDeleteI think that it is a great idea on the behalf of facebook. Collecting a percentage of the funds from sending individuals gifts. Im not about to use this, i believe that it takes the people to people aspect of gift giving out of the picture. i hope facebook upgrades their security because the spam and hacking are out of control.
ReplyDeleteThis blog is very informative and makes me aware of possible facebook scams. I never was aware that facebook had a gift shopping app and will consider it when in need of purchasing a gift.
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