Facebook is Grinch Stealing X-mas: MoveOn

MoveOn.org plans to campaign against Facebook's "Beacon" ads, and do it on the social networking site's own turf, News.com reports. MoveOn promises an ad drive, a protest group, and an online petition over the advertisements—which post information about users' purchases on friends' news feeds. MoveOn calls the ads a “glaring violation of users’ privacy.”

Users can opt out, but MoveOn says the option is “well hidden” and must be repeated for each buy. A Facebook partner site director admitted the tactic surprised some users, but predicted they will “see it as a good thing" in time. "What's bad is that people are probably going to blame the merchant and not Facebook," he said. (More MoveOn stories.)