(WHAS11) - It's one of the internet's most popular websites, but now Facebook is under attack by the people who use it every day.
Unhappy users claim the social networking site makes it too hard to guard their privacy and as WHAS11's Andy Treinen found, some clients are now saying, "get out of my face Facebook!"
Type the words “how do I" on Google and “deleting Facebook account” is the third most popular search. It’s the result of thousands of people trying to delete their Facebook accounts.
"If more people really understood thoroughly how their information is being exploited, they would be outraged," says internet activist Alana Joy Kylow.
They're outraged over Facebook's new privacy default settings that allow third parties to view users' information, such as interests.
The only way to keep outside companies from doing so is for the user to manually change the setting.
It’s a move that has even the European Union and the U.S. Congress criticizing the changes.
"The default position should be that the information is not shared, not that the information is shared," says Senator Al Franken.
Some technology experts say blame the bottom line.
"The only way to make that it can make a lot of money in future is by data mining, that is, by selling things it learns about the private lives of half a billion people who are in its system," says Software Freedom Law Center Director Eben Moglun.
The larger question is whether anyone who uses social media or the internet in general can ever have an expectation of privacy.
"If you're translating something into ones and zeroes and putting it on the internet, know that it's probably going to get out there in some way, at some point," says Kevin Pereira, who hosts Attack of the Show.
In fact, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently said that was the very basis of his site's success.
"People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people and that social norm is just something that's evolved over time," says Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook.
When asked specifically about the controversy, Facebook issued a statement saying, "Of course we're working on responding to these concerns but we don't have anything to announce at this time."
Facebook's working hard to avoid that fate, but it's a fate now in the hands of its users,” says Alana Joy Kylow.
Right now Facebook has more than 400-million active users worldwide.
