The Federal Trade Commission has confirmed that it has opened a nonpublic probe into Facebook's privacy practices, saying it's committed to protecting consumers' privacy and data and will hold accountable companies that abuse the FTC guidelines.

In a statement, the FTC said it takes "very seriously" recent press reports raising concerns about the data security at the social media giant, according to Bloomberg.

And with that, the public is getting an important early clue into the shape of the federal response to revelations about Facebook's handling (abuse?) of user data for commercial purposes.

The FTC investigation, which was reported by Bloomberg last week, is focused on whether Facebook violated terms of a 2011 consent decree over its handling of personal user data.

Additionally, German Justice Minister Barley said Monday in Berlin that Facebook's data practices couldn't be tolerated and that sanctions against the company should be levied at the EU level. He added that the company needs to be more transparent about its algorithms.

Facebook shares, which plunged into correction territory last week, collapsed further on the news.

And it's not helping that Mark Zuckerberg is dumping his shares into this freefall...