Post by cjm on Apr 14, 2018 8:36:47 GMT
A normal person's guide to this week's Facebook Congressional testimony
Not so sure of the following
Facebook tracks you, even if you’re not logged in or you don’t have an account
This is one of the most complicated things that Facebook does and, even with nearly 100 people to question him, officials seemed to have a hard time nailing this down. The short version is: Yes, Facebook tracks people who aren’t logged into Facebook and even people who don’t have an account. According to Zuckerberg, this is to help them target ads for people who do have accounts, and prevent those who don’t have accounts from trying to scrape public information that’s associated with Facebook users.
This happens via Facebook technology like those “like” buttons you see on web pages, or an invisible version called the Pixel, which doesn’t show up on the site, but still helps the company collect information. Using browser cookies and app integrations, Facebook knows where you go around the web and uses that data to observe and analyze your behavior.
As Zuckerberg pointed out many times, it’s technically possible to opt out of this, but it’s not easy to parse all of the settings you need to change in order to do so. The Atlantic has a solid explainer about this exact issue that’s worth checking out.
This is one of the most complicated things that Facebook does and, even with nearly 100 people to question him, officials seemed to have a hard time nailing this down. The short version is: Yes, Facebook tracks people who aren’t logged into Facebook and even people who don’t have an account. According to Zuckerberg, this is to help them target ads for people who do have accounts, and prevent those who don’t have accounts from trying to scrape public information that’s associated with Facebook users.
This happens via Facebook technology like those “like” buttons you see on web pages, or an invisible version called the Pixel, which doesn’t show up on the site, but still helps the company collect information. Using browser cookies and app integrations, Facebook knows where you go around the web and uses that data to observe and analyze your behavior.
As Zuckerberg pointed out many times, it’s technically possible to opt out of this, but it’s not easy to parse all of the settings you need to change in order to do so. The Atlantic has a solid explainer about this exact issue that’s worth checking out.
Not so sure of the following
The data issues in the 2012 Obama campaign and the 2016 Trump campaign were fundamentally different
Several officials brought up the fact that the 2012 Obama campaign also successfully gathered and leveraged user data, which sounds similar to what happened during the 2016 election. Zuckerberg, however, clearly stated that the actions that happened in 2012 were within the rules of the platform, while the Cambridge Analytica scandal was a clear violation of the terms of service.
Several officials brought up the fact that the 2012 Obama campaign also successfully gathered and leveraged user data, which sounds similar to what happened during the 2016 election. Zuckerberg, however, clearly stated that the actions that happened in 2012 were within the rules of the platform, while the Cambridge Analytica scandal was a clear violation of the terms of service.