PRIVACY/IDENTITY: Facebook Connect becoming defacto "identity card" for web?
Bill Densmore
BELOW EXCERPTED FROM: http://www.technologyreview.com/web/27027/
Published by MIT
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Facebook Wants to Supply Your Internet Driver's License
And new security measures protect everyone's data.
By Simson Garfinkel
Although it's not apparent to many, Facebook is in the process of transforming
itself from the world's most popular social-media website into a critical part
of the Internet's identity infrastructure. If it succeeds, Facebook and
Facebook accounts will become an even bigger target for hackers.
As security professionals debate whether the Internet needs an "identity layer"
-- a uniform protocol for authenticating users' identities -- a growing number
of websites are voting with their code, adopting "Facebook Connect" as a way
for anyone with a Facebook account to log into the site at the click of a
button.
Facebook's identity system might very well supply something that VeriSign,
Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google have all struggled to offer: a single "driver's
license" for the Internet. (This leaves aside the question of whether it's a
good thing for one company to hold such a position of power.)