UK Won’t Ban Facebook – Facebook, Twitter and Research In Motion met with United Kingdom officials Thursday regarding the social networks’ role in summer riots there. The government ended up not moving to restrict access to the social networks in emergencies such as riots.

Facebook Takes Third Spot for Video – Facebook becomes the third largest video site on the Internet, comScore reported. That is 51.5 million people who watched videos on the platform in July.

AT&T to Discontinue Facebook Phone – AT&T is reportedly set to drop its “Facebook phone” called the Status, according to TechCrunch.

Places More Popular Than Foursquare – London developer Golden Gekko reports its clients report much more Facebook check-ins than Foursquare in Europe. Magnus Jern reported that the ratio ranged from 5-10 to 1. However, the future of the service is unclear.

Facebook Hit 1 Trillion Pageviews - Facebook surpassed 1 trillion pageviews according to Google’s Ad Planner tool, although comScore says otherwise.

Facebook Mobile App to Offer Photo Filters - Facebook looks to be competing with Instagram’s classy mobile app by offering almost a dozen photo filters to its mobile own application — following Facebook’s attempt to buy the startup, according to The New York Times. News of the feature first leaked out in June.

Recapping Facebook’s Bug Bounty – Neal Poole did a basic rundown of Facebook’s Security Bug Bounty program, which included information about multi-line JavaScript URI, redirects preserving fragment portions of URLs, XSS filters and more.

Facebook Wraps Up Farm Bureau Dispute – Facebook and the Farm Bureau had a dispute over Facebook trademarking “FB,” but it seems like the lawsuit is set to be wrapped up.

Milyoni Chart for Credits – Milyoni created a nice chart and whitepaper that includes ways that Facebook Credits can, and cannot, be used.

Facebook to Open Second Campus - Facebook is set to open up an additional campus from its current Menlo Park, Calif. headquarters. The second campus pwill be southwest of the current location, to be constructed in 2013 to accommodate about 2,800 employees.

Ticketmaster Allows Users to Find Friends – Line Nation’s Ticketmaster service launched an app that allows users to see where their friends are sitting on seat maps and tag themselves.

BBC Does Facebook On-Demand Video – BBC has developed an on-demand Facebook application allowing users to rent episodes from the show “Top Gear” for 48 hours.

ShopIgniter, Involver Partner – The two companies are entered into a partnership to help online retail businesses with a management content system.

German Privacy Office Condemns Like Button – The privacy office of Northern German state Schleswig-Holstein has called for a ban of the Like button on grounds that it violates user privacy by sending browsing behavior data to Facebook. Starting at the end of September, it plans to sue German websites still using the plugin for 50,000 euro. Facebook says it is operating in compliance with European data and privacy laws, is approved by German’s central government, and the head of the complaining office, Thilo Weichert, is known to be a grandstander. 

Facebook Claims Ceglia Forged Docs – Facebook’s lawyers have revealed that they believe to be in possession of the “real” contract signed between Mark Zuckerberg and Paul Ceglia, who claims to own half of Facebook. The original contract, Facebook’s lawyers say, does not mention anything about Facebook. This same contract was also found on the servers of a law firm in Chicago. [Image Via Facebook]

Comments Box Helps Websites – A side-by-side comparison by the LA Times of Facebook’s Comments Box social plugin and an unauthenticated identity commenting system showed Facebook’s plugin improved civility of comments, drove more referral traffic, and sped up site loading.

Interpublic Group Sells Half Facebook Stake – IPG sold about half its Facebook stake, initially purchased for $5 million in 2006, for about $133 million this week. Now the group will take its profits and buy $450 million worth in shares.

Apple Store Incorporates Facebook - Apple’s online store now incorporates Facebook and Twitter integrations, allowing customers to share what they plan to purchase.

Facebook, Yahoo Test 6 Degrees of Separation – Facebook and Yahoo have partnered for a social experiment to see by how many associations people around the world are connected. The Small World Experiment will test the hypothesis that people are connected by “six degrees of separation.”

Facebook Publishes Security Guide – Facebook has published “A Guide to Facebook Security”, a 20-page .PDF written by security researchers designed to teach Facebook users how to protect themselves. It outlines how to avoid common scams, use Facebook’s security features, and explains that hackers might pretend to be popular apps like FarmVille, but Zynga and other developers aren’t to blame.

Facebook Zip Code Ad Targeting Inaccuracies - ClickZ reports that some early tests by Ads API developer XA.net indicate that in some cases Facebook may be showing that the expected audience for ads targeted to a specific zip code is higher than the census population for that zip code. This could be due to inaccuracy in how Facebook assigns users a zip code based on the city they list in their profile or where the site believes their IP address is located.

Sony’s PSVita to Include Facebook – Sony’s Vita handheld game console will include Facebook and other social apps when or soon after it launches, according to Electronista. The apps will be available for free on the PlayStation store.

UK Officials Meet With Facebook to Stem Riots – United Kingdom officials are set to meet with Facebook, Twitter and BlackBerry regarding their corporate responsibility to not fuel riots, such as those recently plaguing London. One possible outcome: to suspend social networks when governments deem it an emergency.

NYPD Forms Social Media Tracking Unit – The New York Police Department has recently formed a unit specifically to track activity on Facebook and Twitter. Specifically information about parties, gang activity and other problems will be the focus. [Image via Facebook]

Facebook is Not Posting Phone Numbers – Facebook is responding to a viral warning that the company is “stealing” or posting users’ phone numbers for everyone to see. It says phone numbers of friends are kept private.

European Social Network Netlog Banned From Facebook – Netlog, a European social network with roughly 80 million user has been banned from the Facebook Platform after it tried to “access internal Facebook APIs and deliberately compromised intended limitations of our platform acebook has banned the European,” Facebook said.

Facebook, Ceglia, Continue to Duel – Last week Facebook announced that it had “smoking gun” evidence against would-be Facebook owner Paul Ceglia to prove that his lawsuit is frivolous. Then, it turns out, Ceglia is in Ireland and saying he’s being harassed by Facebook.

More Facebook Means More Narcissism – Facebook can lead to mental health issues for teens according to one psychology professor’s research. The American Psychological Association conference presentation included information that heavy Facebook users suffering anxiety and depression, and are more likely to be narcissistic.

Facebook Helps College Newspapers – Facebook has created a guide for college media on how to use Facebook in different ways in the newsroom. [Image via Facebook]

Our Eyes Perceive Facebook, Google+ Similarly – A study found that Google+ has a setup that allows users to perceive it almost identically to Facebook. The study from EyeTrackShop tracked the order of visual fixation for 54 users, finding high correlation between the two networks.

Google+ Set to Surpass Twitter – A study from the UK found that Google+ is set to become the second-largest social network after Facebook.

Other Announcements:

Vitrue, Clear Channel Radio Partner – Vitrue and Clear Channel Radio have announced a partnership in which all of the company’s 850 radio stations will implement Vitrue’s SRM platform.

Buckaroo Unveils Social Media Promotions – Buckaroo has announced a new way that businesses can combine social deals with email marketing, Facebook and Twitter. The technology is designed for small businesses.

Career Notify Leverages Facebook in Job Hunt – Career Notify is a recruitment and head hunting service that sends email notifications to Facebook friends and contacts whenever anyone gets a new job, promotion, or resigns.

Facebook made some exciting hires this week, in addition to the usual suspects from the company’s Careers Page and LinkedIn feed, the company hired a former aide to President Barack Obama, Sarah Feinberg, and Google’s former director of product management for search, client and infrastructure products, Tom Stocky.

Feinberg was formerly a special assistant tot he president, worked as the communication director for the House Democratic Caucus, a press secretary for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and was also a press secretary for former Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle. Now Feinberg will still work in communications, focusing on safety, security and litigation. Stocky has worked for Google since 2005 and is joining Facebook as a director of product.

The company also hired more interns, some engineers, people in Asia and Africa, marketing and more.

New hires per LinkedIn and Other Sources:

• Elke Karskens, Head of Platform Marketing & Communication EMEA – formerly the Platform marketing Manager at Skype.
• Alex Şuhan, Software Engineer – formerly a Teaching Assistant at Politechnica University of Bucharest.
• Connor Hayes, Analyst, Online Sales Operations – formerly a features editor at The Rice Thresher.
• Justin Allen, Account Executive – previously did similar work at Apple.
• Caitlin Hipskind, University Recruiting – formerly a Recruiter Coordinator at Facebook.
• Tatyana Bezuglova, MBA Intern, User Operations for EMEA – previously worked as a Senior Associate at The Boston Consulting Group.
• Jonasz Pamuła, Software Engineering Intern – formerly a Linux Software Engineer at NComputing.
• Ivan Georgiev,  Software Engineer Intern – previously did similar work at Musala Soft.
• Shomir Dutt, User Operations Analyst – formerly a student.
• Binoy Xavier, Network Deployment Engineer – previously worked as a Network QA Test Engineer at Brocade.
• Jesse Chen, Marketing & Product Analytics Intern – previously did similar work at LinkedIn.
• Heather Marquez, Asset Manager – formerly a manager of Asset Lifecycle & Logistics at eBay.

Prior listings now removed from the Facebook Careers Page:

• Business Analyst, Hyperion
• Product Manager, Tax Technology
• Product Manager, Technical Operations
• Strategic Product Manager
• Growth Manager Africa – Contract (Nigeria or Kenya)
• Strategic Partner Development, Local Monetization (Palo Alto)
• Lead, Data Warehouse Operations
• User Interface Engineer, Communication Design
• Financial Analyst – Information Technology
• Account Executive (Hong Kong)
• Account Executive (Sydney)
• Client Partner (Paris)
• Sales Associate (Sao Paulo)
• DSO Account Manager (Hong Kong)
• Strategic Partner Development, Local Monetization (Palo Alto)
• Manager, Online Sales Operations (Palo Alto)
• Associate, Ad Operations (Chicago)
• Manager of Online Sales & Operations (Austin)
• Manager of Online Sales & Operations (Palo Alto)
• Manager of Online Sales & Operations (Austin)
• Manager, Online Sales Operations (Palo Alto)
• Lead, Risk Management (Austin)
• Analyst, Platform Operations (Hyderabad)
• Monetization Product Marketing – Sales and Marketing Solutions
• Marketing Communications Copywriter
• Web Optimization Engineer 1106002

Who else is hiring? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies in the industry.

Facebook’s Upcoming “Awesome” Announcement Could Be Video Skype – Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hinted to reporters that a big announcement was set for next week, specifically, something “awesome.” A press event has been scheduled for Wednesday, July 6th. Some sources and the invite to the event suggest that Facebook might unveil a video chat system built in partnership with Microsoft’s Skype. Other possibilities include Facebook’s leaked mobile photos app, it’s iPad app, or the Music Dashboard.

Antitrust Complaint Filed Against Facebook Over Credits – Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy group, has filed an antitrust complaint with the Federal Trade Commission regarding Facebook’s Platform currency, Credits. Their complaint is that Credits is an “anticompetitive” virtual currency that could drive up prices of virtual goods.

Facebook Deals Coming to Three More Cities – Facebook tell us it is expanding the beta test of its prepaid coupon service Deals from its initial five cities to include Charlotte, St. Louis, and Minneapolis. Facebook says early feedback from businesses has been positive, though we haven’t seen much adoption in San Francisco.

Facebook Hires Hacker – Facebook hired George Hotz, the guy who jailbroke the iPhone. He’s now helping Facebook create its iPad app.

Photos From Facebook’s New Office – Gawker published photos from Facebook’s new headquarters in Menlo Park, which the company plans to start moving to soon. The gallery depicts an open office floor plan similar to the current Facebook HQ’s design.

Facebook Pitches Social Program Guide to Media Industry – Facebook’s SVP of Strategic Partner Development Andy Mitchell spoke at at the PromaxBDA conference, telling media industry representatives about how a television program guide that showed what a viewer’s friends watch could get people to watch more.

Hulu Botches Facebook Connect Integration –  A error in how Hulu implemented a Facebook login system on its video site caused people to become logged in to the accounts of other users. Hulu claims responsibility for the problem and says no highly sensitive information was exposed. The site will remove the Facebook integration temporarily before trying another implementation.

Facebook Scores in Ownership Lawsuit – Paul Ceglia, a man in New York who claims to own most of Facebook, has been ordered to give Facebook access to his emails and computer. The company is set to accuse him of forgery.

American Express Launches Free Social Media Monitoring Tool - In a bid to help and attract small businesses, American Express launched a free tool called YourBuzz that lets businesses monitor mentions of them on Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, and other web services.

How the NHL Gained 2.2M Fans - AllFacebook reported an interesting case study detailing the National Hockey League’s efforts to grow its Facebook Page by 2.2 million Likes by targeting its affluent and tech savvy fans. [Screenshot Via AF]

Thailand Bans Facebook Before Vote – The Thai government has banned Facebook political campaigning the day before a Saturday vote for prime minister.

Facebook Reaches 750M Users – TechCrunch reported this week that Facebook has reached 750 million monthly active users according to a “source close to the company.” The data we recorded in Inside Facebook Gold as of June 1st showed 687 million worldwide. Facebook’s last official update was 500 million, last July.

Facebook Display Ads Pass $2B – A new report from eMarketer claims that this year Facebook will be the top online display advertiser with $2.19 billion in revenue, representing 81% growth over last year.

Skype Deepens Facebook Integration – Skype reported new Facebook features this week, including instant messaging, integrated contacts and the ability to Like or comment on statuses.

Facebook’s IPO Rumors Spur Real Estate Inflation – In light of rumors of a Facebook IPO next year, Silicon Valley home prices are surging, prompting some residents who begin to sell off their homes.

Report: 1 Like is Worth 20 Pageviews – A new report from Hitwise found that 1 Facebook fan, or Like, is equal to 20 visits to a retailer website during the course of the year when it comes to ROI.

Announcements

Techlightenment Launches Social Attribution System —This week Techlightenment launched its Social Attribution System, which anonymizes user data, tracking their actions, and then identifies the viral nature of those actions.

ShortStack Launches Free Tab App for Small Biz – Reno, Nevada-based ShortStack launched a tab design app this week free of charge for small businesses with 2,000 Likes or less to run contests, sweepstakes, create landing tabs with videos or photos, and other features.

New Rules Could Delay Facebook IPO – Congress may change laws regulating companies with shareholders, ultimately meaning that Facebook could delay its IPO if it wanted to. Fortune Magazine reported that the rules currently state that companies breaking 500 shareholders must go public, but the new rules would allow companies to remain private indefinitely.

Facebook IPO Could Surpass $100B – Facebook may make an IPO in early 2012, according to a report from CNBC. What’s more, they are saying the valuation could be more than $100 billion.

Existing Rules Apply to Political Ads on Facebook - The FEC declined to rule on creating extra regulations for Facebook political ads, reported AllFacebook. This means that ads can be bought and run with the same disclosure that applies to other online ads instead of having to state who paid for an authorized the ads, which could take up much of their character limit.

Facebook Users More Social in Real Life – A Pew Center for Internet & American Life Project study found that Facebook users tend to be more trusting, have more closer friends, are more civically engaged and get more social support from friends in real life.

Most Will Engage With Facebook Political Messages – SocialVibe conducted a study on political engagement advertising, finding among other things, that 94% of users who engaged with political messages ended up watching the entire message, and almost 40% of them shared political ads with Facebook friends.

iOS Integrated With Facebook Before Twitter - TechCrunch wrote an interesting piece this week noting that, before Apple’s iOS deeply integrated with Twitter, it was pretty obvious the company had looked into doing the same thing with Facebook.

Copious Launches Social Marketplace – Copious, co-founded by former Facebook employee Jonathan Ehrlich, launched a social marketplace this week that’s meant to incorporate Facebook’s social data into the business of buying and selling merchandise between individuals. TechCrunch reported that Copious has raised $2 million, in part from Foundation Capital, Google Ventures and BlackBerry Partners Fund.

Iceland Crowdsources its Constitution – The Icelandic government has turned to Facebook, in part, to help draft a new Constitution. Members of the country’s constitutional council are posting drafts of clauses for the constitution, and fans are invited to leave their comments. The council is also streaming its meetings live.

Zuckerberg Talks to Kids – Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke to a graduating eighth grade class in Menlo Park, California. He told them that friendships are what make life meaningful, and gave the students some advice, “‘Everything that’s worth doing is actually pretty hard and takes a lot of work.”

Facebook has hired second-term Clinton administration press secretary Joe Lockhart, AllThingsD reported yesterday. He’s going to work as Facebook’s new vice president of global communications, starting in July.

He’ll also be working alongside another former White House staffer, Marne Levine, who recently joined to lead Facebook’s worldwide lobbying efforts.

Both will report to Elliot Schrage, Facebook’s long-time vice president of global communications, marketing and public policy. Schrage will in turn increase his focus on technology and policy issues going forward; his official comment on Lockhart’s hire, below.

Joe’s arrival brings new skills and greater depth to our incredibly busy team. His experience building and running a press office at the White House gives him particular appreciation for the demands of a global 24-hour news cycle and the challenges of responding effectively to intense scrutiny. His experience launching and scaling a communications firm will help us as we seek to build our team and continue to offer great opportunities for growth and professional development.

Lockhart is set to move to California following his daughter graduates from high school in Washington, D.C., according to the report. After leaving the White House, he founded and worked as managing director of the Glover Park Group, a well-respected consulting firm in the capitol.

ShareThis: 56% Of Sharing Is Via Facebook – ShareThis, the maker of a sharing widget available on a variety of web sites, conducted a study finding that 56% of all content shared online goes through Facebook.

Facebook, Tech Companies Back AT&T, T-Mobile Merger – Facebook, along with Yahoo and Microsoft, filed letters supporting the acquisition of T-Mobile by AT&T mostly because of how the merger would affect wireless broadband.

Buddy Media IPO? – It would appear that Page management giant Buddy Media is set for an IPO based on the hiring of former Yahoo-er Dennis Morgan as CFO.

Facebook Likes Flash Servers, Fusion-io’s IPO Shows – Fusion-io’s IPO this week for $1.8 billion revealed some interesting data about Facebook, specifically that the company accounts for 52% of flash memory chip maker Fusion-io’s revenue in the first quarter.

Apple Builds Facebook Integration into iOS5 – Apple’s new iOS5 for iPhones and other mobile devices allows users to add Facebook handles into the entries in its native Contacts app.

Emotions Spread Among Friends Via Facebook – A new study by Facebook’s data scientist Adam D.I. Kraner found that emotions such as happiness or sadness are contagious when shared between friends using the Facebook news feed. Writing positive words such as “happy” and “hug”, and negative words such as “sick” in status updates can impact the emotions of friends for up to three days.

TopProspect Reports Top Tech Companies – TopProspect reported that more workers are flocking to work at Google, Facebook, Microsoft, LinkedIn and Apple while Microsoft, Yahoo!, Google, eBay, and Amazon are losing employees. Facebook is winning the talent war, though, with it gaining employees from most of the others tracked. It is poaching especially efficiently from Microsoft, from whom it gained 30.5 employees for each one it sent to the Seattle-based company.

Bing Mobile Enables Facebook Sharing – Bing for Mobile Browser, m.bing.com, just enabled some new social features, including allowing users to easily share some types of search results to Facebook, such as images and local business details. [Screenshot via Bing]

Facebook Expands Women in Computing Program – Facebook quadrupled, to 20, the number of Facebook Grace Hopper Scholarship recipients this year for female university students who excel in computer science. The scholarship includes full-paid trips to Facebook HQ and this year’s Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference in Portland, Oregon where COO Sheryl Sandberg will be the keynote speaker.

Postagram Launches Android App – Postagram, which allowed users to transform Instagram photos into postcards, has created an Android app that doesn’t allow users to actually take Instagram photos, but rather, make postcards from photos on their phone or Facebook accounts. The iOS version of the app can also now import Facebook photos. [Image via TechCrunch]

Facebook Activity Led to Arrest in Iran – One man in Iran was purportedly arrested for activities on Facebook, which is banned in that country. Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty reported that Houshang Fanaian was arrested for posting about his religion, which is banned in Iran.

White House Polls Facebook Fans -The White House announced this week the results of an informal Facebook and Twitter poll that found, among other things, 62% of users visit the Page on a weekly basis and about 56% share posts on a monthly basis.

France Bans Mentioning “Facebook” on TV, Radio – Due to a law banning the promotion of commercial enterprise on news programs, French broadcasters are no longer allowed to say “Facebook” or “Twitter” on the airwaves unless the social networks are part of the story. Thus, saying “Like us on Facebook” is now forbidden.

In another effort by Facebook and other technology companies to inform developers about privacy issues — and show the world they don’t need legislation in order to stop abuses on their platforms — they’re launching an informational site together with advocacy group called the Future of Privacy Forum.

Called the “Future of Privacy Forum: Application Privacy,” the site promises information on “emerging standards, best practices, privacy guidelines, platform and application store requirements, as well as relevant laws and regulatory guidance.” For now, though, parts of the site lack content or otherwise don’t feel fully baked.

For example, under the “Learn/Resources” tab, in a section called “Hot Data Issues and Important Alerts,” an area called “1) Transmission of User IDs in Mobile Devices” provides links to a Wall Street Journal series on mobile app data leakage. Oddly, the section features Facebook’s reaction, noting that the company at one point said that it has “zero tolerance for data brokers.” The thing is, the issue was about mobile platforms, which Facebook doesn’t offer. The site appears to have conflated the mobile app incident with an earlier Wall Street Journal article that looked into data issues being passed by canvas apps on Facebook.

The site only launched in the last week, so we’re not going to judge too harshly yet. The practical benefits it does currently provide include a wide variety of links to other materials developed by governments, privacy groups and platform companies, which should be especially useful for developers who are new to platform development, and all the associated privacy issues.

Meanwhile, as active developers already know, each platform already goes well out of its way to tell developers about what they can and can’t do with user data. Facebook in particular has built out a series of policies and guides over the years to explain to developers what they can and can’t do on the platform, and it has restricted or removed some developers’ access to the platform due to abuses. By this point, any serious Facebook developer should have a clear idea about what they can and can’t do.

The same goes for Apple, Google and other companies who provide platforms, who have also become embroiled in privacy issues — and who are also sponsors of this new site, and of the Future of Privacy Forum. When questioned about their efforts to educate developers about privacy issues, the companies now have this site to point to. But in terms of making a big impact on how developers behave, it’s not clear what difference the site is going to make.