Facebook 2012 Annual Report Download - page 17

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Please find page 17 of the 2012 Facebook annual report below. You can navigate through the pages in the report by either clicking on the pages listed below, or by using the keyword search tool below to find specific information within the annual report.

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Sales and Operations
The majority of our marketers use our self-service ad platform to establish accounts and to launch and
manage their advertising campaigns. We work directly with advertisers, through traditional advertising agencies
and with an ecosystem of agencies that have a specialized focus on Facebook advertising. We also have a global
sales force that is focused on attracting and retaining marketers and providing support to them throughout the
stages of the advertising campaign cycle from pre-purchase decision making to real-time optimizations to post-
campaign analytics. We currently operate more than 30 sales offices around the globe.
We have operations teams to provide support for our users, developers, and marketers in five regional
centers located in Menlo Park, California; Austin, Texas; Dublin, Ireland; Hyderabad, India; and Singapore. We
also invest in and rely on self-service tools to provide direct customer support to our users, developers, and
marketers.
Marketing
To date, the Facebook user community has grown virally with users inviting their friends to connect with
them, supported by internal efforts to stimulate user awareness and interest. In addition we have invested and will
continue to invest in marketing our services to build our brand and user base around the world. We leverage the
utility of our products and our social distribution channels as our most effective marketing tools. In addition, we
undertake various user acquisition efforts and regularly host events and conferences to engage with developers
and marketers.
Intellectual Property
To establish and protect our proprietary rights, we rely on a combination of patents, patent applications,
trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, including know-how, license agreements, confidentiality procedures, non-
disclosure agreements with third parties, employee disclosure and invention assignment agreements, and other
contractual rights. In addition, to further protect our proprietary rights, from time to time we have purchased
patents and patent applications from third parties. We do not believe that our proprietary technology is dependent
on any single patent or copyright or groups of related patents or copyrights. We believe the duration of our
patents is adequate relative to the expected lives of our products.
Government Regulation
We are subject to a number of U.S. federal and state, and foreign laws and regulations that affect companies
conducting business on the Internet, many of which are still evolving and being tested in courts, and could be
interpreted in ways that could harm our business. These may involve user privacy, rights of publicity, data
protection, content, intellectual property, distribution, electronic contracts and other communications,
competition, protection of minors, consumer protection, taxation and online payment services. In particular, we
are subject to federal, state, and foreign laws regarding privacy and protection of user data. Foreign data
protection, privacy, and other laws and regulations are often more restrictive than those in the United States. U.S.
federal and state and foreign laws and regulations are constantly evolving and can be subject to significant
change. In addition, the application and interpretation of these laws and regulations are often uncertain,
particularly in the new and rapidly-evolving industry in which we operate. There are also a number of legislative
proposals pending before the U.S. Congress, various state legislative bodies, and foreign governments concerning
data protection which could affect us. For example, a revision to the 1995 European Union Data Protection
Directive is currently being considered by legislative bodies that may include more stringent operational
requirements for data processors and significant penalties for non-compliance.
In August 2012, the FTC approved a settlement agreement with us to resolve an investigation into various
practices, that, among other things, requires us to establish and refine certain practices with respect to treatment
of user data and privacy settings and also requires we complete bi-annual independent privacy assessments.
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