But the document sharing and embedding service has created a privacy nightmare that involves drafting users who are already logged into Facebook without offering a clear opt out process either on the site or through e-mail.

Instead Scribd has been creating subscriptions and followers on behalf of a user by sending e-mails to contacts obtained through Facebook’s friends list and notifying them — all without requiring the user to ever click a button.

“Obviously privacy is extremely important to us,” says Michelle Laird, spokesperson for Scribd. “But, overall, we believe the experience is one that is welcoming you to Scribd and telling you who your friends participating in Scribd are.”

This is not the first time that it has launched a feature on an opt-out basis. Earlier this year it introduced Readcast, a feature that broadcasts the documents people download to other Scribd users. And as with instant personalization, Readcast was also opt out, rather than opt in. That move drew the ire of Santa Clara University law professor Eric Goldman, who wrote about it on his blog. This week, Scribd changed the process so users now have to clearly indicate they want to be part of Readcast.

In its latest move towards instant personalization, Scribd is counting on piggybacking on Facebook’s presence on the user’s browser.

Since I check Facebook a few times in the day, I am almost always logged into the service. On Wednesday — two days after Scribd launched its instant personalization service, of which I was completely unaware — I found a Scribd link in a Google search I ran.

After spending a few minutes on the Scribd link to scan through the document, I moved away to do other things. Barely three hours later, I got an e-mail from a co-worker who is also a Facebook friend saying I had subscribed to him on Scribd.

I had never clicked on any buttons on Scribd or signed up for the service. So I went to the Scribd homepage and found my Facebook photo there with a note saying I have ‘26 subscriptions’ — basically a list of my Facebook friends who also had a Scribd profile.

Scribd spokesperson Michelle Laird says the company gives users “multiple opportunities to opt out” but if users don’t click the “no thanks” button, they get an instantly personalized, automatically-filled profile out connecting their Facebook with Scribd.

Since I never saw the “multiple opportunities to opt-out” I asked Scribd for a details on when users are presented with opt out options. Turns out, there’s just a banner at the top of a page that tells users they can opt out by clicking on it — so says Scribd, because I don’t remember seeing it. So the default is opt in and not opt out, and the notification is something that looks like the banner ads most of us look right through — not something trying to get your attention as a consequence of something you did or were about to let happen.

And, if like me, you missed that banner, don’t hold your breath for a welcome e-mail from the company, offering a chance to opt out. Scribd says it doesn’t send an e-mail for at least 24 hours telling a user they have been signed on to a personal page on the site. But it does immediately send out an e-mail to friends on your list saying you are following them on Scribd and asking them to sign up.

“The email communication should not have happened the way it did,” says Laird. “We are taking it under immediate review.”

There are ways to get out of the instant personalization. For starters, you can delete your profile on Scribd — yes, that’s the nuclear option. Or better yet, you can turn off instant personalization in Facebook’s privacy setting.

Every service lets you share and many integrate with Facebook, and there are probably some people who will be delighted that Scribd let’s you link up with the friends you have in common on both services. That’s the social trend, to be sure. But it’s wrong to make the process opt-in, to have only obscure and untimely methods to opt out and to send e-mail blasts out to ‘friends’ with nobody’s explicit permission — that’s the definition of spam.

Scribd is a valuable service but it needs to fix its process. Even better, it needs to stop making opt in the default for all its new features. Until then, Scribd users, be ready to see your Facebook information splashed all over Scribd.

See Also:

• Scribd Pushes Content to Smartphones, E-Readers
• Major Publishers Partner with Scribd for Viral E-book Marketing
• FYI, Pandora Makes Your Music Public
• Fixing Poor Privacy Notification, Pandora Forces Users to Choose
• Google Tweaks Buzz After Overblown Privacy Backlash

Authors: Priya Ganapati

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