Creepy Facebook ads that stalk me with my friends should go away

I remember the days when it was the norm to create a pseudonym for a social network or a creative email address that in no way reflected the owner’s real world identity. A wonderful example of this is my former AOL user name, WkSteele4 and other various names I would rather not share. (They’re still anonymous)

I’m not sure when the shift happened but at some point I noticed everyone around me had first.lastname@gmail.com for their mail and their phone numbers on Facebook.

I don’t mind it so much, yes I could go back to being anonymous and I know a few of those people on Facebook but I don’t think it would be worth it. I enjoy how a lack of anonymity shapes communities and how it makes them more useful. (I can be found by people that I want to find me, IE people I know IRL)

That being said, I recognize that I’ve given up a lot of my information freely and without question yet it’s still creepy and offending when I see it used in unethical ways.

Specifically, this feeling came over me today when I saw a little add, that had borrowed the name and picture of one of my friends to try and lure me to click somewhere.

I know for a fact that my friend had not “challenged me to a game of Bubble Boomers” but what am I to say at this point?

Somehow that app has ‘borrowed’ my friend’s data, either through me or through them allowing the app and while we get what we click for, it’s still wrong. Our personal information and our identity is sacred (at least it is to most people) and when it’s misappropriated its offensive.

I know that I’ll be removing the app and double checking my privacy settings but it’s still a big wide web out there and who knows where it leads to.