The Dutch government said Friday that it may be forced to stop using Facebook after a warning from the Netherlands’ privacy regulator about the Meta owned social media platform’s privacy risks.

The Dutch Data Protection Authority (DPA) issued a statement advising the Dutch Interior Ministry not to rely on Facebook pages to communicate with citizens if it doesn’t have a clear idea of how Facebook uses the personal data of people who visit government pages.

  • @[email protected]
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    597 months ago

    Good. Also you shouldn’t need a relationship with a corporation (account) to get information from government agencies…

    • @[email protected]
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      137 months ago

      You don’t. They’re usually posting awareness campaigns that link to government sites.

      I’ve opted the example to elsewhere, but they’d be like “bought a house? Find out how the taxes work on (link)”

      • @[email protected]
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        97 months ago

        It depends on the government I suppose. US National Weather Service offices posts bunch of weather info exclusively to Twitter (and sometimes Facebook).

        • @[email protected]
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          47 months ago

          Yeh generally it’s about reach. In the case of NWS Technically its not exclusive as their data and messaging is distributed by other channels, including traditional, and their own site(s). But for ticking the social media box they’re likely to select the platforms with the most reach. Dissappointing that its only the one if that is the case, but the US is the land of officiated orthodoxy I’ve found. There are advantages sometimes - less triplication of labour in the case of humans needing to curate social media output for example. Bring on interoperability of platforms, please.

          • @[email protected]
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            37 months ago

            Technically its not exclusive as their data and messaging is distributed by other channels, including traditional, and their own site(s)

            Not in my experience. I know because I’ve corresponded with my office, and complained about posts that aren’t tied to a particular weather product (like the Weather Story) or disseminated otherwise.

      • @[email protected]
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        37 months ago

        Can you read posts on Facebook without an account? Last time I tried it wasn’t possible.

        • @[email protected]
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          7 months ago

          The posts aren’t constraining the information though. They’re effectively advertisements linking to the information (advertising they have info for you to read).

          The information itself is public and freely accessible.

          • @[email protected]
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            37 months ago

            In many cases no it is not…

            The sheriff’s department in my town for example has no information on the public website for the municipality. All of their information is shared on Facebook and only Facebook.

            The same thing goes with many other departments and public services.