Facebook's Beacon Settlement Appealed By Privacy Advocate

Facebook user and privacy advocate Ginger McCall, who objected to a class-action settlement stemming from the defunct Beacon program, has appealed the order approving the controversial deal.

The agreement, authorized earlier this year by U.S. District Court Judge Richard Seeborg in the Northern District of California, calls for Facebook to permanently shutter Beacon, its 2007 marketing program that told members about their friends' off-site retail purchases. The deal also requires Facebook to create a $9.5 million settlement fund, two-thirds of which will be used to launch a new privacy foundation (with the remainder going to attorneys' fees). That organization will be directed by a three-person board that includes Facebook's director of public policy, Tim Sparapani. Some privacy groups had criticized the settlement, arguing that Facebook would exert too much control over the new organization. McCall, an attorney with the Electronic Privacy Information Center, says she would like to see the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rule that the settlement was improper. "It puts the fox in charge of the henhouse," McCall says of the arrangement.