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Response to Free Basics
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Free Basics Myths and Facts
A response to Internet-org myths and facts and Response to free basics opponents.
Claim : Facebook’s Free Basics is an Open Platform. Rationale: It is open to all developers agreeing on Facebook's technical guidelines
Response:
Secured connection; HTTPS is allowed only with a "dual certificate", better known as a Man-In-The-Middle attack, where Facebook can read and tamper with Data Passing through the Free Basics platform.
The first requirements ensure that none of the new services on Free Basics can have interactive content, which might compete with interactive services of Facebook owned companies. It should also be noted that the technical guidelines do not mention that the services owned by Facebook will have the same restrictions.
The second requirement means service like digital social network, messaging and email services have to agree to share their secure data with Facebook or not participate in the Free Basics Platform.
Other requirements that we noticed are:
It may take 8 to 10 weeks to receive a response from a member of the Internet.org team.
A developer is required to have a Facebook account, and is required to agree to Facebook's Terms of Services in addition to Free Basics terms.
Rationale: Facebook does not receive or give any money to developers, telcos or anyone else for their participation in Free Basics, nor does Facebook generate any revenue from the version of Facebook within Free Basics as there are no ads in it.
Response:
3.
Claim: Facebook gets access to all usage data of sites that are on Free Basics is a myth.
Rationale: “Facebook takes user privacy and security extremely seriously. Free Basics receives and stores data on navigation information – the domain or name of the Third-Party Service accessed through Free Basics, and the amount of data (e.g. megabytes) used when you access or use that service – because it needs to determine what traffic can be delivered free of data charges. Facebook does not store any personal navigation information from within the service beyond 90 days. We don’t share any personally identifiable information with our content partners and there is no requirement for those partners to send Facebook such information about their users.”
Response: The secured connection clause in technical guides implicitly ensures that Facebook has access all usage data of sites that are on Free Basics. Facebook also doesn’t claim that it will not monetize on the data or combine it with the navigational data of Free Basics with the data collected through Facebook and its other services.
Facebook already tracks Facebook users and nonusers browsing behavior to sell them targeted ads.The whole business model of Facebook revolves around advertising and monetization of user data. If Facebook claims that they are or they won’t use data collected through Free Basics for their advantage then the burden of proof lies with Facebook. One way to do is it open source the Free Basics platform and infrastructure and invite third party researchers to verify their claims.
