Snapchat the social media service that promised its customers instant privacy by destroying their messages within 10 seconds has been slammed by the US Federal Trade Commission.
The sanction from the US regulator is part of a world-wide crack down on App manufacturers by regulators in over 33 countries for not disclosing the purpose of their technology.
The FTC alleged that rather than destroying messages as Snapchat maintained, that they could be stored in a number of different ways and that as opposed to not storing an individuals geographical location that the company did exactly the opposite.
According to the FTC’s complaint, Snapchat made a series of claims to consumers about its product that stood in stark contrast to how the app actually worked.
Speaking about the FTC decision Chairwoman Edith Ramirez commented: “If a company markets privacy and security as key selling points in pitching its service to consumers, it is critical that it keep those promises.
“Any company that makes misrepresentations to consumers about its privacy and security practices risks FTC action.”
Touting the “ephemeral” nature of “snaps,” – the term used to describe photo and video messages sent via the app – Snapchat marketed the app’s central feature as the user’s ability to send snaps that would “disappear forever” after the sender-designated time period expired.
Snapchat’s undoing happened after a successful hack upon the company, which compromised 4.6m user names and phone numbers, and revealed the full extent of the company’s activities.
Following the hack, a subsequent FTC investigation, found that despite Snapchat’s claims, that there were several simple ways that recipients could save snaps indefinitely.
The FTC charges, which have been accepted by the technology company, now mean that Snapchat will be independently monitored for the next 20 years to ensure that it meets privacy and security requirements according to an FTC spokesman.
“The ultimate goal of all of this is to underline to companies that when they make a privacy promise to consumers that they should ensure that they fulfil it.
“We want to see more transparency for the consumer about the date collected and used about them – this has been a concern of the commission for a number of years now,” said the FTC spokesman.
A tough challenge according to lawyers working in the area who are highlighting transparency and privacy issues as the most important battleground for human rights in the information age.
“Beyond the legal settlement, there’s a bigger technology question about anonymity on the Internet and whether mobile messaging services and other popular social media applications can successfully build and maintain privacy enhancing technologies that really work.
“The Internet has a long memory and there’s some debate as to whether these messages, photos and the like have a limited shelf life or live on forever, ” commented Craig Newman, leading technology specialist for the Washington and London law firm Richards, Kibbe and Orbe.
