6 ms·

Google Engineer Builds Facebook Disconnect

135 points by bwaldorf 16y ago

Kliment 16y ago
I do something similar with adblock filters. I don't use Facebook, so I have no privacy issue with connect, but it does improve load/render times by multiple seconds.
- Estragon 16y ago
  Would you mind sharing? Sounds useful.
  - Kliment 16y ago
    I block the following: static.ak.fbcdn.net ||connect.facebook.net^ *.facebook.com Among a bunch of others, but these are the FB-related ones.
    - Estragon 16y ago
      Thanks.
- iambvk 16y ago
  I too don't have a facebook account and the worst issue with Facebook connect is, its login box steals keyboard focus and completely annoys my browsing experience. I hope he releases this as Firefox extension too.
  - Snoddas 16y ago
    FacebookBlocker https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/212323/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/212323/
nozepas 16y ago
Of course one should be 'worried' about privacy with his/her data on facebook, but i don't think one should care less with the information google has about a huge amount of people. Just as a reminder: they know what you look for on the web (google itself), they know what you talk to your friends (gtalk), they know what you get via email (gmail), they know what videos you watch to (on youtube) and they now even have a browser which is being adopted by a lot of people pretty fast. Maybe one does not use all those services but many people do, and depending on how you look at it, probably google has a lot of more 'private' information about one's life than facebook. That, of course, doesn't mean 'FB disconnect' is a bad idea. It's just that i get 'scared' when someone who know a lot about you (google in this case) build something trying to look as they 'protect your privacy'... (i also keep in mind that google is not prone to providing data about users, but they have the ability to)
- Kliment 16y ago
  Do note this was neither sanctioned nor designed by Google. The guy who built it just happens to work there.
- revorad 16y ago
  Why is it bad if google or facebook know a lot about people? Can you give me some examples?
  - pyre 16y ago
    Pooling all of that information into one place is begging for it to be abused. Would you still be asking the same question if it was s/Facebook/NSA/g or s/Google/FBI/g or even s/Google/KGB/g? Once all of this information is in place how hard do you think it will be for such organizations to get access to it? Just because the 'big bad guberment' isn't the one doing the collecting doesn't mean that the information cannot be abused internally, or externally to the company compiling it.
    - revorad 16y ago
      Usually these discussions sound like some people are worried that the corporations themselves will do something bad with the data (sell you more stuff you like !gasp!). Government misusing data is the only thing I could think of. But what's the evidence for that fear? If the organisations you mention wanted to go after people, can't they already do so? With this kind of reasoning, the internet itself should qualify as a huge setback to privacy. The point is that the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages.
StavrosK 16y ago
Come on, we already have a perfectly good protocol for this, OpenID. It's unfortunate how big companies try to lock users in their own authentication services rather than educate them about OpenID (although I think the new JanRain widgets turn OpenID into a "Connect with X" service, which is great).
- jpdbaugh 16y ago
  It's too bad OpenID isn't cool. The Social Network movie is just going to exacerbate people's infatuation with Facebook and social networking in my opinion. This will lead to the common person being even more accepting of Facebook becoming ubiquitous across the internet. The side benefit of the movie though is that I am finding girls are much more into me talking about working as programmer at the bar...
  - StavrosK 16y ago
    Yeah, I think that's its biggest "failure". Facebook is something everyone knows, so they think "oh, Connect button, cool". It's a shame, really. Unless someone writes a Facebook <-> OpenID bridge, anyway.
- krosaen 16y ago
  Unfortunately, OpenId is too complicated for most folks. paste in your url? c'mon. Even Brad Fitzpatrick realizes this: http://code.google.com/p/webfinger/ http://code.google.com/p/webfinger/ "People have been trying to use URLs as identifiers for people (as OpenID does), as it has great readability/discoverability properties, but this effort has largely failed because of UI/UX design failings, user confusion about URLs, etc."
  - StavrosK 16y ago
    You don't have to, there are widgets you can use where you just select your provider and enter your username, and everything's done.
    - 16y ago
uptown 16y ago
You can use FacebookBlocker to accomplish the same thing with extensions for Firefox, Safari, and Chrome: http://webgraph.com/resources/facebookblocker/ http://webgraph.com/resources/facebookblocker/
lwhi 16y ago
You know you're heading down a rocky road when third parties are creating your app's privacy functionality.
- pmjordan 16y ago
  s/third parties/Google/ (I realise this isn't an official Google product)
danielnicollet 16y ago
If you are that worried about Facebook privacy, just create a fake account and stuff it with fake data on your fake persona. This way, not only you will be expressing your disdain for Facebook's lack of privacy, you'll also be saying to Facebook: I don't like you but I use you ;-) Or better yet, use OpenID.
msy 16y ago
I do this system-wide on OSX via Glimmer Blocker (http://glimmerblocker.org/ http://glimmerblocker.org/) using a modified version of the Facebook Like filter on their wiki (http://glimmerblocker.org/wiki/Filters http://glimmerblocker.org/wiki/Filters). Has a nice bonus of speeding up page load as well.
j_s 16y ago
Direct link to the Chrome extension: https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ejpepffjfmamnambagiibghpglaidiec https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ejpepffjfmamnamb... It is a bit odd to blame this on Google unless the guy created it at work. From the page: "the work here is entirely my own and in no way endorsed by Google." edit: disclaimer is on the actual download page!
middlegeek 16y ago
Can't this be blocked on a FB level already? I don't see those "FB Connect" boxes anymore. To be honest, I cannot even remember what setting I changed in FB, but it seems to work. (I also have disabled applications and not sure if this makes a difference but I use Adblock Plus as well.)
gacek 16y ago
A browser extension to block a single service? Use a general "browser firewall" and add http://*.connect.facebook.*/* http://*.connect.facebook.*/* to the list of blocked urls...
- jules 16y ago
  The browser extension is useful, even more so for non-technical people: you click a button and it's installed.
  - iuguy 16y ago
    How many non-technical people do you know that use Chrome as their primary browser? I ask this because while I know plenty of tech savvy people that use Firefox, I'm in the minority on the Chrome/Chromium front amongst them, and I don't know a single non-technical person who uses Chrome.
    - jaspero 16y ago
      I know quite a few non-technical person who use Chrome. I cannot guarantee that they know how to install an extension though. Most of the non-tech people uses internet primarily for FaceBook and they shouldn't be concerned when they see their FaceBook on say, CNN.com.
      - jules 16y ago
        Installing this extension is as easy as clicking the big Install button on its page and then click Install when Chrome asks you whether you really want to install the extension.
        jaspero 16y ago
        You still need to go to Chrome extension website right? It's not that when you go to a website that has FB connect, the Chrome asks if you want to block it or not. That would be effective though.
jaspero 16y ago
It's a blessing for people like me who see the 'you are not authorized to visit this site and will be reported' kind of message on your office computer.
mloc 16y ago
This cannot be good for Google. If I was an exec at Google I would be very nervous about this. This is a good excuse and opportunity for people to start writing more ad blocking plugins. I am sure Google would not want that.
joeyh 16y ago
What's interesting to me is that this is done in Chrome, which has given eg, Adblock some trouble since it does not really allow extensions to change the page content, only hide parts of it. Would be interested in a technical look at how it's managing to filter out the facebook bugs given that limitation -- or has Chrome been updated to give extensions more power?
- izak30 16y ago
  knowing nothing else about chrome extension development: Rapportive appears to modify page content in chrome
bosch 16y ago
I'm hoping a Facebook engineer designs something similar for Google's privacy issues...
- ramanujan 16y ago
  An Adwords blocker for Chrome? An tool which automatically logs you into Facebook when presented with a choice of OpenIDs which includes Google's?
mongx 16y ago
another great extension for improving sanity and privacy on facebook is f.b purity. The app blocking functionality, helps protect your privacy from all those spammy quiz and game applications that appear in your newsfeed http://www.fbpurity.com http://www.fbpurity.com

135 points by bwaldorf 16y ago

I do something similar with adblock filters. I don't use Facebook, so I have no privacy issue with connect, but it does improve load/render times by multiple seconds.

Estragon 16y ago
Would you mind sharing? Sounds useful.
- Kliment 16y ago
  I block the following: static.ak.fbcdn.net ||connect.facebook.net^ *.facebook.com Among a bunch of others, but these are the FB-related ones.
  - Estragon 16y ago
    Thanks.
iambvk 16y ago
I too don't have a facebook account and the worst issue with Facebook connect is, its login box steals keyboard focus and completely annoys my browsing experience. I hope he releases this as Firefox extension too.
- Snoddas 16y ago
  FacebookBlocker https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/212323/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/212323/

nozepas 16y ago

Of course one should be 'worried' about privacy with his/her data on facebook, but i don't think one should care less with the information google has about a huge amount of people. Just as a reminder: they know what you look for on the web (google itself), they know what you talk to your friends (gtalk), they know what you get via email (gmail), they know what videos you watch to (on youtube) and they now even have a browser which is being adopted by a lot of people pretty fast. Maybe one does not use all those services but many people do, and depending on how you look at it, probably google has a lot of more 'private' information about one's life than facebook. That, of course, doesn't mean 'FB disconnect' is a bad idea. It's just that i get 'scared' when someone who know a lot about you (google in this case) build something trying to look as they 'protect your privacy'... (i also keep in mind that google is not prone to providing data about users, but they have the ability to)

Kliment 16y ago
Do note this was neither sanctioned nor designed by Google. The guy who built it just happens to work there.
revorad 16y ago
Why is it bad if google or facebook know a lot about people? Can you give me some examples?
- pyre 16y ago
  Pooling all of that information into one place is begging for it to be abused. Would you still be asking the same question if it was s/Facebook/NSA/g or s/Google/FBI/g or even s/Google/KGB/g? Once all of this information is in place how hard do you think it will be for such organizations to get access to it? Just because the 'big bad guberment' isn't the one doing the collecting doesn't mean that the information cannot be abused internally, or externally to the company compiling it.
  - revorad 16y ago
    Usually these discussions sound like some people are worried that the corporations themselves will do something bad with the data (sell you more stuff you like !gasp!). Government misusing data is the only thing I could think of. But what's the evidence for that fear? If the organisations you mention wanted to go after people, can't they already do so? With this kind of reasoning, the internet itself should qualify as a huge setback to privacy. The point is that the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages.

StavrosK 16y ago

Come on, we already have a perfectly good protocol for this, OpenID. It's unfortunate how big companies try to lock users in their own authentication services rather than educate them about OpenID (although I think the new JanRain widgets turn OpenID into a "Connect with X" service, which is great).

jpdbaugh 16y ago
It's too bad OpenID isn't cool. The Social Network movie is just going to exacerbate people's infatuation with Facebook and social networking in my opinion. This will lead to the common person being even more accepting of Facebook becoming ubiquitous across the internet. The side benefit of the movie though is that I am finding girls are much more into me talking about working as programmer at the bar...
- StavrosK 16y ago
  Yeah, I think that's its biggest "failure". Facebook is something everyone knows, so they think "oh, Connect button, cool". It's a shame, really. Unless someone writes a Facebook <-> OpenID bridge, anyway.
krosaen 16y ago
Unfortunately, OpenId is too complicated for most folks. paste in your url? c'mon. Even Brad Fitzpatrick realizes this: http://code.google.com/p/webfinger/ http://code.google.com/p/webfinger/ "People have been trying to use URLs as identifiers for people (as OpenID does), as it has great readability/discoverability properties, but this effort has largely failed because of UI/UX design failings, user confusion about URLs, etc."
- StavrosK 16y ago
  You don't have to, there are widgets you can use where you just select your provider and enter your username, and everything's done.
  - 16y ago

uptown 16y ago

You can use FacebookBlocker to accomplish the same thing with extensions for Firefox, Safari, and Chrome: http://webgraph.com/resources/facebookblocker/ http://webgraph.com/resources/facebookblocker/

lwhi 16y ago

You know you're heading down a rocky road when third parties are creating your app's privacy functionality.

pmjordan 16y ago
s/third parties/Google/ (I realise this isn't an official Google product)

danielnicollet 16y ago

If you are that worried about Facebook privacy, just create a fake account and stuff it with fake data on your fake persona. This way, not only you will be expressing your disdain for Facebook's lack of privacy, you'll also be saying to Facebook: I don't like you but I use you ;-) Or better yet, use OpenID.

msy 16y ago

I do this system-wide on OSX via Glimmer Blocker (http://glimmerblocker.org/ http://glimmerblocker.org/) using a modified version of the Facebook Like filter on their wiki (http://glimmerblocker.org/wiki/Filters http://glimmerblocker.org/wiki/Filters). Has a nice bonus of speeding up page load as well.

j_s 16y ago

Direct link to the Chrome extension: https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ejpepffjfmamnambagiibghpglaidiec https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/ejpepffjfmamnamb... It is a bit odd to blame this on Google unless the guy created it at work. From the page: "the work here is entirely my own and in no way endorsed by Google." edit: disclaimer is on the actual download page!

middlegeek 16y ago

Can't this be blocked on a FB level already? I don't see those "FB Connect" boxes anymore. To be honest, I cannot even remember what setting I changed in FB, but it seems to work. (I also have disabled applications and not sure if this makes a difference but I use Adblock Plus as well.)

gacek 16y ago

A browser extension to block a single service? Use a general "browser firewall" and add http://*.connect.facebook.*/* http://*.connect.facebook.*/* to the list of blocked urls...

jules 16y ago
The browser extension is useful, even more so for non-technical people: you click a button and it's installed.
- iuguy 16y ago
  How many non-technical people do you know that use Chrome as their primary browser? I ask this because while I know plenty of tech savvy people that use Firefox, I'm in the minority on the Chrome/Chromium front amongst them, and I don't know a single non-technical person who uses Chrome.
  - jaspero 16y ago
    I know quite a few non-technical person who use Chrome. I cannot guarantee that they know how to install an extension though. Most of the non-tech people uses internet primarily for FaceBook and they shouldn't be concerned when they see their FaceBook on say, CNN.com.
    - jules 16y ago
      Installing this extension is as easy as clicking the big Install button on its page and then click Install when Chrome asks you whether you really want to install the extension.
      - jaspero 16y ago
        You still need to go to Chrome extension website right? It's not that when you go to a website that has FB connect, the Chrome asks if you want to block it or not. That would be effective though.

jaspero 16y ago

It's a blessing for people like me who see the 'you are not authorized to visit this site and will be reported' kind of message on your office computer.

mloc 16y ago

This cannot be good for Google. If I was an exec at Google I would be very nervous about this. This is a good excuse and opportunity for people to start writing more ad blocking plugins. I am sure Google would not want that.

joeyh 16y ago

What's interesting to me is that this is done in Chrome, which has given eg, Adblock some trouble since it does not really allow extensions to change the page content, only hide parts of it. Would be interested in a technical look at how it's managing to filter out the facebook bugs given that limitation -- or has Chrome been updated to give extensions more power?

izak30 16y ago
knowing nothing else about chrome extension development: Rapportive appears to modify page content in chrome

bosch 16y ago

I'm hoping a Facebook engineer designs something similar for Google's privacy issues...

ramanujan 16y ago
An Adwords blocker for Chrome? An tool which automatically logs you into Facebook when presented with a choice of OpenIDs which includes Google's?

mongx 16y ago

another great extension for improving sanity and privacy on facebook is f.b purity. The app blocking functionality, helps protect your privacy from all those spammy quiz and game applications that appear in your newsfeed http://www.fbpurity.com http://www.fbpurity.com