Social networking giant Facebook, the largest such site in the U.S., recently has been urging users to update their privacy settings in connection with ongoing changes to the service. The changes coincide with the recent deal between Facebook and Internet search giant Google Inc. (GOOG) to bring data from the social network into the search engine as real-time data.

Many Facebook users are finding that parts of their profiles are now public, whether or not they want them to be. Facebook may share public information with software developers who build services for Facebook users. Concerns over privacy have prompted 10 privacy organizations, lead by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

The New York Consumer Protection Board has has asked the FTC to hold up approval of the Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) purchase of DoubleClick, until it answers questions about the potential for abuse of the resulting customer database. The NYCPB is worried that merging Google's database with DoubleClick's will result in personal internet usage information that is detailed enough to pose a threat to user security.

You'll recall I ranted about Google's invasive practices earlier, when Google announced a new feature, Google Search History, that offered to show you its records of every place you've ever visited as a result of a Google search.

The NYCPB is worried that cyberthieves might access this data, and challenges Google to demonstrate the strength of its defenses. They also want pre-defined measures that will be taken should someone suffer a loss as a consequence of data theft from the Google records, or in the event Google fails to comply with an opt-out request.

Part of the current scramble in the internet world toward vertical integration of content and marketing revolves around developing the richest customer databases possible, so that ads can be targeted to the individual. Content providers can charge more for narrowly targeted advertising, and vendors can increase sales, so both have a vested interest in gathering as much info about an individual as possible.

This challenge to this merger probably won't kick off a large-scale debate over just how much data we allow companies to gather about us, but the debate is coming. And I'd guess, soon, perhaps as soon as the 2008 political silly season.

In an earlier post, I confessed to not getting what the big deal could be over AOL's release of some customer search data (and for which they've expressed regret). Thanks to fellow BloggingStocks writer Amey Stone, for pointing me toward the consumerist. One factor I had not considered is that the very nature of the searching that someone might do, might also tend to reveal their identity. I google myself, and probably no one not named "Michael Canfield" is likely to google that name as often as those few of us that have it. Data like that (or searching your own social, or other personnel data) can be matched up with other searches that could be potentially embarrassing, invasive, or damaging. I guess.

To be fair to those for whom this issue is a high concern, one never knows who's watching, what they're looking for, or what they might do with it.

Michael Canfield still doesn't own stock in Time Warner