Two celebrated achievers stirred conversation among more than 80 of Dubai’s C-suite executives over a breakfast at the city’s Capital Club this month, (May 16 2013).

Sir Bob Geldof, the Irish rock star, businessman and human rights activist provoked a high-energy debate on the relationship between creativity and humanity, probing the question of their role in business.

Geldof, who was knighted by Britain’s Queen Elisabeth in 1986, was joined by Keith Reinhard who carries the title of Chairman Emeritus – or life-long chief – of DDB Worldwide, consider one of the world’s leading advertising firms.

Reinhard told Sir Bob and the audience that in his view sustainable business must sit on a foundation of strong corporate values.

Sharing his 30-year experience at the helm of DDB, Reinhard suggested that DDB’s own guiding pillars could help other organisations also attain sustainability.  

“As DDB grew into the global organisation that we see today, I have no doubt that it is business basics built on a culture of freedom that have stood us in good stead and will continue to be our driving force.

“Indeed, our pillars are so simple that if fully embrace they might well have similar application and effect for other enterprises of all shapes and sizes.”

Reinhard said that no one wants to be controlled and by nurturing a work environment that honours liberty internal energy is released and, properly channelled, is manifested as external output.

“When I speak of humanity, I am referring to care and compassion for people, those who work with and for us, those we serve and those with whom we share the planet.” 

He noted that Bill Bernbach - the ‘B’ in DDB - had a keen understanding of humanity and laid the groundwork with his original twin hiring criteria - be both talented and nice.  “Once hired, Bernbach set his talented, nice team free in workplace and the result was – and still is - superior creativity”.

“As you might expect, people who are both talented and nice, working in an environment characterised by freedom, often want to give of their time and talent to purposes beyond making sales and taking a share,” he said.

DDB’s inaugural ‘Breakfast With…..’ series is jointly hosted DDB Dubai and the Saudi arm, PDDB with DDB’s digital agency, Tribal DDB;  Tracylocke, a consumer and shopper marketing engagement agency; and CRM/DM full-service house, Rapp.  DDB Worldwide is one of the world’s largest and most awarded advertising and marketing networks spanning over 200 advertising and marketing agencies in 96 countries.

DDB Worldwide’s Pillars of Freedom

Freedom from Fear – Talent freezes in the grip of fear. Management by intimidation has no place in a creative organisation.

Freedom to Fail - If people are urged to explore new territory, their efforts may not always succeed, and if we expect them to try again, they must have the freedom to fail.

Freedom from Chaos - Talent flounders in an atmosphere of management indecision, vacillation, arrogance and uncertainty.

Freedom to Be - Each individual has a right to be treated with dignity, to be supported in his or her ambitions for higher achievement.

The entire buzz about content creation by every brand has been pushed to heights. Somehow all the marketers now have a never ending belief in content marketing and power that it possesses. But are all brands content brands?

In a five-part interview series about the challenges and opportunities that social media presents to the brand idea Stephanie Myers of JWT Canada interviewed Ingrid Bernstein to reveal few interesting disclosures. Here’s what we’ve  gathered:

The first thing she pointed out was that marketers need to take on strategic and production hurdles to turn their brand into a content brand.

While researching about the same topic I came across numerous examples of creating a great contend brand but thing that stuck with me was a website’s comparison of Tom Cruise as a brand to that of other brands and how the veteran actor has kept himself up and alive through dark patches as well.

Tom Cruise certainly makes for a compelling model of how to run a brand and there are many things a business can learn about reputation management and content strategy from him.

To derive the crux of his strategy, Cruise delivers to his core audience while attracting new fans with moderately risky creative choices, still keeping himself fresh for critics and colleagues with strategic, iconoclastic roles that challenge the core Cruise brand.

One must manage your brand identity through choices in content. The days of the “EAT HERE” ad campaign are no more. There are too many alternatives. Like it or not, everyone is now in the content business. Involve and evolve—or dissolve.

Here is a brilliant divide to keep up the content strategy simple yet extremely effective:

• 70 percent of our content should be solid, standard stuff. Basic how-tos and advice those are safe and easily justified as supporting SEO and other efforts.

• 20 percent of our content should riff on the 70 percent, but take some chances. This is the content that expands on 70 percent content, but may flirt with controversy, or try appealing to a new audience, or otherwise be moderately risky. It may also take a bit more effort. It also offers a higher potential payoff.

• 10 percent of our content should be completely innovative. Things we’ve never done that, if they work, could become part of the 20 or 70 percent. Ten percent content often requires a lot of work or audience interaction. Or it’s just risky. Most of the 10 percent will fail. You still have to do it. It’s really important, because without it, the entire strategy stagnates.

“Building an ROI model for a brand is quite elusive for most brands. Part of the challenge is that brands advertise because they want to sell more and sometimes it’s hard to measure the impact of a social media strategy on that outcome. There are all these other intermediary outcomes. Things like the number of ‘Likes’, the amount of comments, the amount of social validation, the amount of participation, the amount of sharing. Brands have to be comfortable with that being a measureable goal.” Said Ingrid, in the interview.

When asked that could all brand be content brand she explained “One of the factors we take into account with brands that want to get into content marketing is asking: “Is there a white space for that brand?” Is there a place that they can add value in a way they can own within that category? When brands make content they aren’t competing with other brands; they’re competing with other publishers and other content creators. If you’re in the beauty space for example, it’s very hard to find white space as a brand. The same is true of culinary food based brands. It can be done; it’s just that finding that own-able territory is the big challenge, and the key to success.”

Lastly on how to identify that whether an idea will be a success in social media or not she stated “One of the biggest things I think about when I look at ideas is, “Will someone want to do this?” We talk a lot about value exchange—whether we’re asking more of people than we’re giving them. This is a very fundamental question that has to be asked. What will actually motivate people to want to participate? If there’s not something in it for them, there are so many other things competing for their time.”

Data sourced from PRDaily and JWT Blog

Smart business owners understand the power and importance of mobile marketing to their bottom line. They use mobile apps to connect with customers, share relevant news, offer great deals, increase foot traffic, take reservations, and boost their revenues. Whether they deliver a service, sell products in a store, or run a successful restaurant, they know that having a mobile app is one of the most effective ways to reach customers on the go.

But not all apps are made equal — scroll through the iOS App Store and you’ll find countless offerings that are useless to users and a waste of money from companies. In fact, some apps actually make the businesses that produce them look worse to potential consumers than if they never put that app on virtual shelves.

There are few features an app must have to become a hit among the consumers:

•The importance of having some way for users to provide feedback on your app is critical. Whether it is a button or a link to open an email doesn’t matter; the important part is that you give your users a quick way to report bugs, and provide suggestions or criticisms. Users will appreciate knowing that you are open to their feedback and that their input can shape the future of your app.

•For many brands, especially retailers, what matters most is location. The ability to provide customers with recommendations and offers based on their whereabouts is a killer feature for many marketers. Small Luxury Hotels of the World, a network of premium independent inns, published an app that suggests to travelers nearby points of interest based on their phone's GPS coordinates, accelerometer and compass.

•Start the user experience out right! Use Facebook Connect or another single sign on technology solution to allow your customers to use their social media logins to sign into the mobile app (and keep them signed in). And always give them a way to retrieve their user name/password or remind them which social network they used when setting up the app.

•A compelling mobile application must feature an interface that focuses on usability. The best way to do this is to follow the general application hierarchy of widely used apps like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

•If you must ask users to register, sign up, or fill out forms, be zealous about eliminating every possible click, or tap, from the design. Ask for less information. Conversion rates fall sharply when extra work is required to sign up.

•The content in it must be something that is impossible to gain from your website. Stop building apps that are just big web browsers, and focus on pushing relevant information and delivering a richer experience that is beyond what your mobile website can do.

•It’s very important to make sure the app isn’t slow. People used to despise Facebook because of how slow the mobile app is. It is crucial that your app doesn’t make people wait around while it loads.

With an increasing mobile app demand, the app download is going to reach 180 billion by 2015, predicts IDC and the industry will reach $25 billion by 2015 reports MarketsandMarkets. The penetration of mobile and internet in the Middle East is on the rise and there is a huge scope for mobile app startups. 

Nowadays, lots and lots of bloggers and website operators use the microblogging website Twitter as a marketing method so that their business can grow much faster as well as easier.  With over 140 million active users, and 340 million Tweets per day, the social network is one that brands cannot ignore.  With over 140 million active users, and 340 million Tweets per day, the social network is one that brands cannot ignore.

Brands get a lot of advantage out of twitter during real time events by bidding on promoted hashtags, accounts and tweets related to the event that draws attention back to their brand.

Ironically, despite the 140 character limit, tweets in the aggregate are “big data” because there are so many of them delivered each day. But scale is not the only challenge an analyzing tweets. Tweets have their own linguistic features that differ from Standard English text, making them difficult to analyze by natural language processing tools.

Tweets that contain fewer than 100 characters receive 17% higher engagement rates than longer tweets, according to Buddy Media’s “Strategies for Effective Tweeting” report. This is because leaving extra space allows followers to insert their own comments when they share brand’s content with friends, it explains.

The study, which analyzed user engagement on more than 320 Twitter handles for the world’s largest brands, also found that tweets containing links receive 86% higher retweet rates than those without. Tweets with links - particularly links to images - drive not only click-through rates but help to amplify brand messages to people beyond just that account’s followers.

One of the report’s findings was that tweeting when people are busy will get your brand more engagement. Many brands making their first forays into social media make the mistake of blindly posting the same content across different social networks. Users tend to use Twitter as real time news feed through-out the day, Tweets sent between 8AM and 7PM received 30 percent more engagement than tweets posted outside that timeframe. And surprisingly, Buddy Media’s earlier report on Facebook engagement showed opposite findings.

Brands are becoming increasingly open to the potential of social media, with 77% of marketers saying that they consider Twitter a priority social medium. This figure is only expected to rise as user engagement grows, with a survey of 2,200 online adults finding that while Twitter adoption remain roughly steady, rising from 13% in May 2011 to 15% in February, those users are accessing the service more often.

Mobiles can play a valuable role in reducing the risk that 'showrooming' poses to retailers, according to Steve Hamilton-Clark, CEO of TNS MENA.

Citing the firm's latest mobile research, Hamilton-Clark explained that showrooming - when consumers visit stores to test products but buy them later elsewhere - has emerged as a significant threat to traditional retailers.

TNS's annual Mobile Life study, based on responses from 38,000 people in 43 countries, shows that although showrooming is a very real threat with one third of mobile users admitting to the practise, mobiles can also help savvy brands minimise the risk.

"Among consumers who showroom, two thirds use their phone whilst doing so, providing a major opportunity for brands to interact with consumers via mobile and turn browsers into buyers," Hamilton-Clark said.

Showrooming is a global phenomenon, but the role played by mobiles varies significantly across the world. In markets where the first Internet introduction has been via a handset, shoppers are highly likely to use their mobile when showrooming. The study suggests 87% likelihood in the Middle East and North Africa, 75% in emerging Asia and 67% in Sub-Saharan Africa. 

In developed markets, where online shopping is well established, this is less likely although still strong with figures showing around 56% of showroomers in both North America and Europe using their phones in this way.

Matthew Froggatt, Chief Development Officer, TNS Global said, "While the convergence of digital development, mobile Internet and online shopping poses a very real threat to traditional bricks and mortar retailers, it is also opportunity for brands that get their customer engagement right."

"Some behaviours, such as using a mobile to conduct independent research in-store, present risks to retailers as external influences may increase a shopper's likelihood of purchasing elsewhere meaning retail outlets are left with loss-making display cabinets," he added.

"However, on a brighter note, the study also shows that people are open to engaging with brands whilst in-store. More than one fifth of smartphone owners are said to be keen to receive mobile coupons whilst shopping and a similar proportion indicated interest in apps that help them navigate the store they are in," he said.

The Mobile Life study also shows that knowledgeable sales staff is a valuable asset, with over a third preferring to speak to a sales assistant, whilst the same number would like to look up information on their phone but the idea of a virtual assistant is gathering interest with 13% of those polled open to this.

"This openness to interaction presents a real opportunity for brands that get their mobile strategy right to engage meaningfully at the point of purchase consideration," added Froggatt. 

He said, "Rather than seeing mobile as a threat to in-store sales, brands and retailers must embrace it as the most immediate and personalised way to engage shoppers to ensure they don't leave empty-handed."

Price emerged as one of the biggest drivers, with showrooming consumers looking for reassurance on price and suitability, with 16% globally reading reviews or checking social media in-store to inform their decision-making, and a quarter asking friends and family what they would recommend buying, going as high as 49% in emerging Asia and 42% in India. 

"Mobile may seem like the enemy as it opens up the retail environment to a potentially limitless range of competitors. However, the key for brands and retailers is to find ways to use the mobile to make buying in-store the convenient option," Froggatt observed.

"By understanding exactly how consumers are using their mobile in-store, brands and retailers can improve their own offering through apps, mobile coupons or simply by greater provision of information - and begin to nudge shoppers back towards the tills," he added.

Echoing his sentiments Hamilton-Clark stressed that as mobile engagement grows, consumer brands must be ready to manage a full spectrum of customer services, from assisting pre-purchase research, through to product selection, purchase, delivery, as well as a slick after-sales service. 

"While we continue to choose diverse ways of seeking purchasing reassurance, an integrated approach that meets customer needs at all touchpoints is essential," he concluded.

This is one question that every brand and their managers invariably end up wondering about – what do successful brands do that keeps them successful year after year.

A recent study by research agency Millward Brown and Jim Stengel – former global marketing officer-Proctor & Gamble and now the president of The Jim Stengel company, LLC found out that the 50 brands showing the fastest growth in financial value and customer relationships and regardless of category or their sizes, had one thing in common – they had been built on the ideal of improving their customers life in some way or the other. And to top it all, they communicated exactly this message to their customers. Instead of talking about how great their products were, they talked about how greatly their products would improve your lives.

A company release states, “The study… established a cause and effect relationship between a brand’s ability to serve a higher purpose and its financial performance. Notably, investment in these 50 companies – over the past decade would have been 4005 more profitable than an investment in the S&P 500.”

Jim Stengel, who’s also the author of ‘GROW’ says, “I have always believed that great brands are built on improving the lives of the people they serve; I wanted to prove that maximum profit and high ideals aren’t incompatible but, in fact, inseparable.”

"We wanted to uncover which brands grew the most over the past decade, both in terms of customer bonding and shareholder value," said Millward Brown Optimor VP Benoit Garbe, who led the study. "Once we identified these brands, our burning question was what, if any, were the common principles that sparked and sustained their growth."

To arrive at the Stengel 50, Millward Brown Optimor valued thousands of brands across 30+ countries. The list included both B2B and B2C businesses in 28 categories ranging in size from $100 million in revenues to well over $100 billion:

The ideal, of improving customer’s life, we now know. But what does it translate to a successful brand and business. The report explains that  the research uncovered the extent to which these high-growth brands touch on the five fields of fundamental values as explored in Jim’s book ‘GROW’ – eliciting joy, enabling connection, inspiring exploration, evoking pride and impacting society.

The study is important because it directly links the values of a brand to financial success of the company. It is generally believed the world over, that the in order to be successful, one has to forgo ones ideals. This research clearly shows how that is not the case. Indeed, the case is just the reverse. One actually needs ideals, just the right kind of ideals which follow the age old principle ‘Customer is King’.

Some of the 50 most successful brands found in the research that are also popular in the Middle-East or are from here include: Emirates, Apple, BlackBerry, Coca-Cola, Diesel, Master Card, Red Bull, Mercedez-Benz, IBM, HP, Red Bull, Samsung etc.

Hopefully this research will help marketers change their mindset about importance of values and principle in a successful brand.

The entire buzz about iPods, iPhones, satellite radio, Pandora etc might take a back seat as it is still the radio that dominates the way fans consume new songs. Forty-eight percent of listeners discover music via FM and AM stations, according to a new Nielsen Music 360 study of 3,000 online consumers. In second place for music discovery are friends and relatives at 10 percent, followed by YouTube at just seven percent. The popularity of YouTube is dramatically higher among teens than all adults.

For almost two-thirds of U.S. teenagers, however, Google’s YouTube is now a more important source of music than radio (54%), iTunes (53%) and CDs (50%).

YouTube's music popularity says much about video's popularity among US Internet users. According to comScore, in June:

•84.8 percent viewed at least one online video somewhere

•Google sites had 154.5 million unique video viewers

•Viewers spent an average 484.4 minutes watching videos on Google site

•VEVO and Warner Music on YouTube had 71.2 million unique viewers, watching an average 73.6 minutes of videos

Despite the plethora of social networking, blogs and endorsements, 54 percent of the 3,000 Americans surveyed said they are more likely to buy music on the recommendation of a friend than the endorsement of a music chat room or blog.

The survey also found that 54% of U.S. consumers now have music player apps on their smartphones, given that virtually every smartphone now has a built-in music player, and we can only assume that this number reflects third-party apps. Just under half of them have radio apps installed on their phones and 26% have music store apps.

Based on an online survey of 3,000 U.S. consumers, the wide-ranging music report looks at trends in delivery, buying, listening, social networking and apps as well as live events and how the economy is affecting sales.

As far as which gender buys which genre most often, the leaders are 38 percent of males going for rock, and 15 percent of females preferring Top 40. Only 9 percent of males cited Top 40 as their most-purchased music.

Despite the growing popularity of Internet music services among teens, about a third of them still bought a CD in the last year and among all respondents, 55% said physical CDs are still a very or fairly good value.

Younger folks are more likely to buy music with the first week of its release, with 33 percent of teenagers going that route versus 21 percent of buyers over 18.

The findings reflect a 3 percent slump in U.S. album sales in the first six months of 2012 from 2011, and a 6 percent rise in digital song sales, Nielsen SoundScan reported last month.

The report brings out many startling facts about today's generation and their preferences. It’s great to see radio and Youtube evolve. Google should really capitalize on YouTube's music popularity, even more than it does.

YouTube, which is owned by Google, claims more than 800 million unique visitors every month. More than 3 billion hours of videos are viewed each month and 72 hours worth of video are uploaded every minute, according to the site.

Marketers are always looking out for new and innovative ways to engage with customers. There are a plethora of options available for them to take wise marketing decisions.

This year more than ever, visual content is going main stream. Pinterest is using imagery as its main content, and within a few months hundreds of different websites have adopted a ‘Pinterest like’ design. Companies are switching to Tumblr instead of traditional blogs, with little text and lots of imagery. Facebook is making your profile more visual with the Timeline and the new image gallery, not to mention Instagram.

Visual and social web together have given contest marketing an all new definition.  According to PR Daily News, Pinterest is now the third most-popular social network in the U.S., while photo-sharing platform Instagram recently surpassed 80 million users. Partly why companies are seeing such strong adoption to campaigns conducted through these social networks is because people are able to express themselves more freely and creatively through multiple types of visual media. The colour and presentation of visuals used on social media can act as an extension of your business's branding style.

The big plus point with visual marketing is the engagement it creates and customers feel a powerful connection to the companies and brands that have invited them to participate on a visual, creative level and then share their work.

The online arena is witnessing a shift to visual marketing. The shift is much to do about how consumers access the internet as increasingly people do so with smartphones and tablets.

Facebook’s early growth was much about the ability to share photos with friends and family and the rapidly rising popularity of Instagram and Pinterest only reinforces that we are drawn to images. The advertising industry has long understood the effectiveness of a relevant image to reinforce the desired message.

The numbers tell the story well. According to EyeforTravel’s recent consumer report, the most popular way to use social media in the US is to share travel photos and videos which they are doing via their mobile phones. In fact today most people in the US and UK have a smart phone, which is the device of choice for photography because of significant improvements in quality over the past few years.

Use images to help bring about emotional reactions to your brand stories. Well chosen images can make people feel something that puts them in the right mindset to react more strongly to the text of your stories, and be more inclined to share this information.

McDonald's, one of the leading sponsors of the London Olympics, used Instagram to communicate various messages throughout the games. The company used pictures to tell its stories in new ways and encouraged fans to do the same. The director of social media at McDonald's noted that brands are seeing increasing levels of engagement around pictures compared to text, supporting IFTF's findings.

Social media is supporting contest marketing fully and we see that people really enjoy competing and want their creativity to be appreciated. Consumers invest their time and effort and in turn the brand message is driven home giving marketers a bright opportunity to tap these consumers. Therefore, every new aspect of social media is helping marketers give their marketing and communications mix a boost.

Across the globe marketers are busy devising ways to tap the netizens and wish that they give a second look to their brand online but the story in Middle East is unlike and traditional. People of UAE are still hooked on to Print so much that unlike the rest of the world, they are fervent readers of Print rather than spending long hours on the Social Media sites.

According to the data from an online survey by Ketchum Global Research & Analytics and IPSOS, published in Khaleej Times, “Social media may be growing in the Middle East and opening channels for communication, but users come back to print to read and believe what their leaders have to say.”

When asked which media they trusted most, 48% picked print . Only 16% went for younger, trending media like Facebook, and 8% chose Twitter. Facebookers number 800 million worldwide with 18 million users in the Middle East, which is an 8% penetration in the region, according to Internet World Stats.

Respondents were asked which media was more credible when forming opinions about leaders and leadership. The list contained 15 options and those surveyed had to choose their top five. Personal contact (watching a speech) came tops at 55%. Followed by television at 49% and print at 48% for credibility. Broadcast media came next with 45% and financial publications also scored well trust with 42% opting for them. When queried on the role of communication in leadership, 89% said effective communication was extremely important to great leadership.

In a region like Middle East where people are still relying on Print and are embracing digital media equally well, marketers are in fix to distribute their advertising budget wisely. They definitely can’t reduce the advertising pie off the print and they certainly can’t ignore the social media. Now what to do?

Integrating 2-D mobile barcodes is the best way to assimilate both the media, it happenes in way where no one medium can hamper the effect of another. A growing trend of 2-D mobile barcodes is seen in the US, reports eMarketer.

Only 4% of print ads in the US contained 2-D mobile barcodes in 2011, but their use is growing, according to advertising tracking firm Competitrack. A February 2012 report by the company found that well-planned campaigns put mobile barcodes in attention-grabbing places, and then gave customers a clear call to action to lead them to content.

More than 40% of 2-D barcodes took users to general commerce and product information online, and just over 23% led customers to brand-building sites. The pairing of video with mobile barcodes was also a popular approach, with about 13% of landing pages containing video content. Because users overwhelmingly access 2-D barcodes while on the go, Competitrack suggested optimizing the layout of landing pages for mobile devices.

About 22% of all US mobile barcodes appeared in retail advertising, while roughly 13% were featured in technology ads. Just under 7% of 2-D barcodes appeared in financial services ads, but investment management firm Oppenheimer Funds was the most frequent user of mobile barcodes from any sector—85% of the company’s print ads contained them.

Although there are several different types of 2-D barcodes, the open-source QR code remains the advertising industry standard with almost 90% market penetration, according to Competitrack. And advertisers appear to be deciding on a case-by-case basis whether they need to explain to their target audiences how to use mobile barcodes, which generally require a dedicated code reader app. Earlier research has found that, though many consumers may not recognize the trade names of such codes, they know what to do when they see one.

Integration of various platforms would be the future for marketers and they will have to push one medium through another to hold the key for optimising their brand communication.

It’s great when Facebook helps you find old classmates or helps you with ads for things you want to buy. But how much information is really being collected about you? How is it being used? And could it fall into the wrong hands? Have you ever thought about it?

Facebook keeps a track of the information supplied by the visitor. If the user has never changed his/her default privacy settings, then the user might be sharing more than what he has in his kitty.

A recent study has stated that there are almost 13 million Facebook users at this point, who have never touched their privacy settings and this number seems to be increasing at an alarming rate.

The team who carried the research spoke to Facebook and interviewed a plethora of experts on the matter, including privacy lawyers, app developers, and victims of security and privacy abuse.

2,002 online households, including 1,340 that are active on Facebook were surveyed and the final result was astonishing as 13 million users said they've never set, or were unaware of, Facebook's privacy tools.

Not only this, but 28% also said that they've shared all their wall posts with audiences outside their friend group as well. Some have even shared plans for the day like leaving the house and vice versa making it convenient for burglars.

Privacy problems are on the rise, as various users have complained they had sticky situations with their own log-ins.

The study has split down social privacy into a handful of categories: over sharing by users, minimum use of privacy controls, over collection of data as well as over sharing of data using various apps and lastly cyberbullying or harassment.

Users tend to share more information which invites problems. Several users are unaware that they can change their post or set their status to “friends only,” which can help them reduce the threat.

Being unaware of proper privacy settings they are sharing status to “public” and are getting embroiled in the vicious circle of privacy issues.

Information about privacy settings is available on Facebook’s site. Users are expected to set their privacy protection to levels with which they feel comfortable and protected, which several users fail to register.

Third party apps too can create havoc. Facebook users often pay less attention towards the permissions to these third-party apps. All third-party apps on Facebook require users to “opt-in” by granting permission for an app to look at your news feed, update your status, and so on. It’s up to each individual user that whether he/she should pay attention to these permissions and continue installing the app or just ignore.

Not only this, but the app can retrieve information of the user even if they haven’t installed the app themselves. It is done by accessing information from their friends that have the app installed.

The most prominent problem that has arisen is Cyberbullying and harassment. Several households using Facebook had “trouble” last year, which ranges from a stranger using their login information to online harassment.

The report highlights that cyberbullying against children under the age of 13 is increasing as they subject to harassment. These problems could be anything ranging from commonplace teasing to more extreme and dangerous forms of social rejection. Children from age group 11-13 are mostly targeted as they are naïve and less likely to tell an adult about it.

Children under 13 aren’t supposed to have a Facebook account. But the study projected that there were about 800,000 such accounts in the last year and interestingly, some 5.6 million underage kids still have accounts.

Privacy issues on Facebook are rising but one can take preventive steps as Facebook promises to offer several privacy controls, which should be studied properly.

Every user should think before typing or updating status.

The Facebook pages should be thoroughly checked and reviewed on the basis of individual privacy settings if necessary. Basic information should be protected as setting as “friends of friends” could expose it to tens of thousands.

The wall settings should be made “UnPublic,” and the user should turn off Tag Suggest.  All apps and sites should be blocked.

One should not share every wall post with friends. Users have the authority from keeping certain people from viewing specific items in profile.

If these few preventive steps are followed then the number from 13 million will definitely drop to zero. I am sure after reading this article many will cling to their Facebook profile and shall change the security settings to avoid the “privacy issues.”

At the end, if you think nothing seems to be working then simply deactivate the account because when the user deactivates his/her account, Facebook retains profile data, but the account is made temporarily inaccessible. Deleting an account, on the other hand, makes it inaccessible forever so just deactivate and take a break from Facebook!