You may have heard that Facebook had a problem with physically deleting photos from its servers in a timely manner. In the wake of an investigation first conducted in 2009, as well as a follow-up more than a year later, Ars Technica this week did a second follow-up to see whether old photos have been deleted. Unfortunately, the "deleted" photos were apparently still accessible when accessed via direct link, despite being "deleted" from Facebook.

Jacqui Cheng offers an example: "One reader linked me to a photo that a friend of his had posted of his toddler crawling naked on the lawn. He asked his friend to take it down for obvious reasons, and so the friend did--in May of 2008. As of this writing in 2012, I have personally confirmed that the photo is still online, as are several others that readers linked me to that were deleted at various points in 2009 and 2010."

Responding to a query from Cheng, Facebook spokesperson Frederic Wolens admitted that the company's systems used for photo storage "a few years ago" did not always delete images from Facebook's content delivery networks "in a reasonable amount of time." However, the company is currently working on a new system that will remove photos in a month and a half, and it is expected to be completed within the "next month or two."

This seems an inordinate amount of time for the company to get started on resolving an obvious bug in the system. While some may argue that it speaks poorly for the technical skills of the company, I think there is a far simpler reason at work here--the company never cared enough to give this issue a higher priority.

For more:
- check out this article at Ars Technica

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