Technology - Google News

This Is the Personal Data that Facebook Collects—And Sometimes Sells
WhatsApp Co-Founder Joins #DeleteFacebook Movement
Google News Initiative kicks off with Subscribe With Google, other efforts

This Is the Personal Data that Facebook Collects—And Sometimes Sells

Posted: 21 Mar 2018 07:32 AM PDT

The latest scandal involving Facebook—a data analytics firm that worked for President Trump's campaign and allegedly obtained information on 50 million Facebook users—is a reminder that the social network used to share photos with friends and family also holds a treasure trove of personal data.

There's a lot, and it doesn't really matter if you use Facebook only occasionally.

The collecting and giving away of personal data starts when you sign up for Facebook, gains steam as you use the social network more, and it continues as users add third-party apps.

When you sign up for a Facebook account, you're required to share:

name
gender
date of birth
email or mobile number

From here, Facebook gathers and stores more personal data, which can be used to target users with ads, including what users share and add, and their likes and clicks. That means Facebook tracks and stores data about:

Every ad users click on
Any additional personal information added to the profile including schools, maiden name, hometown and current city, employment, other social networks like political clubs, groups, and alumni associations (current and former)
Every IP address that the user used when logging into the Facebook account
Every friend in the network, including friends that have been deleted
All of the user's activity—ever. Facebook describes its activity log as "a list of your posts and activity, from today back to the very beginning. You'll also see stories and photos you've been tagged in, as well as the connections you've made – like when you liked a Page or added someone as a friend." That means every "like," every status change, and every search of another person on Facebook.

But the real fun begins with third-party apps. These are many apps from Candy Crush and Airbnb to Spotify and Uber that allow users to sign in using their Facebook password. It's so convenient (only one password to remember!) that many people opt in.

Every third-party app is different in the kinds of data that's collected. But the important step to remember is to stop and really read through what you're agreeing to—even if sometimes it's contained in a lengthy legalese agreement—before casually hitting the "continue" to log in using Facebook button. Typically, these apps want access to names, genders, and locations. But many apps dig deeper into personal preferences and friend networks.

From here, all it takes is for the third-party app to sell the data to someone else, like behavior research firm Strategic Communication Laboratories, which is affiliated with Cambridge Analytica, the data firm that worked for Trump's campaign. Facebook has cut down on the information it shares with third party apps. However, it has not been eliminated altogether.

A new report by Fractl found that all that personal data from Facebook and other accounts is being illegally sold on the "dark web" for little more than a few dollars. For instance, the firm found Facebook logins sold for $5.20 each while credentials to PayPal accounts went for an average of $247, reported MarketWatch.

Short of deleting a Facebook account, there are a few other steps users can take to protect themselves, starting with getting rid of all those third-party apps and turning off location data. Go to Facebook settings (nope, not privacy), then "apps," and check how many apps are linked to Facebook.

When I took a look recently, there were 40 apps linked to my Facebook account, which is low compared to others I know who had as many as 100 third-party apps linked to their own accounts.

You can remove these apps. Or you can head over to the apps, websites, and plugins square, click on "edit," and then turn off all third-party API access. Doing so will prevent third-party apps from linking to your Facebook account in the future.

Facebook tracks users locations, but it doesn't have to. There are actually options to deny it location access, or to only give it access when the app is being used. Users can do this with their iPhone or Android, although process is just slightly different.

In Android, go to settings, scroll down and click location. From here, users can slide location on and off. For those with iPhones, go to settings, then privacy, and then location. From here, users can find the Facebook app and pick the location access they want to give.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

WhatsApp Co-Founder Joins #DeleteFacebook Movement

Posted: 21 Mar 2018 07:16 AM PDT

The #DeleteFacebook movement just gained a notable supporter: Brian Acton, co-founder of Facebook-owned WhatsApp.

Acton and fellow WhatsApp Co-Founder Jan Koum sold their messaging app to Facebook in 2014 for $16 billion, becoming very rich in the process. After leaving Facebook last year to start his own nonprofit, Acton is now speaking out against the social media behemoth in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

"It is time. #deletefacebook," Acton wrote on Twitter Tuesday. "Delete and forget. It's time to care about privacy."

Acton's anti-Facebook PSA follows revelations that the London-based political consultancy Cambridge Analytica, best known for its work on the Donald Trump campaign, harvested the personal information of 50 million Facebook users without their permission for political targeting.

Cambridge Analytica obtained the sensitive data in 2014 with the help of psychology professor Dr. Aleksandr Kogan, who developed a Facebook app that not only surveyed 270,000 users over the platform, but also scraped data on their Facebook friends. The 50 million raw profiles were then transferred to Cambridge Analytica, an act that violated Facebook's policies.

Facebook has since "suspended" Cambridge Analytica, Kogan, and other involved parties, but is now facing major flak for failing to prevent this from happening. The Federal Trade Commission is reportedly investigating whether the incident violated a 2011 settlement it reached with Facebook over earlier privacy violations.

Facebook did not immediately respond to PCMag's request for comment about the #DeleteFacebook movement and Acton's support of it.

Meanwhile, this past November, another ex-Facebooker, Chamath Palihapitiya, spoke out against the company, saying social media is corroding society and allows bad actors to "manipulate large swaths of people."

"It literally is [at] a point now where I think we have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works," the former Facebook VP of User Growth said during an interview at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. "That is truly where we are."

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Google News Initiative kicks off with Subscribe With Google, other efforts

Posted: 21 Mar 2018 06:32 AM PDT

Google News Initiative event in New York City, March 20, 2018.

Google's plans to help support publishers' subscription businesses came into fuller color on Tuesday at an event in New York City.

The company is launching a wider framework for working with publishers called the Google News Initiative that builds on several of the projects the company announced last fall. Google's Chief Business Officer Philipp Schindler outlined the three key objectives of the Google News Initiative (GNI) at the event and in a blog post:

Elevate and strengthen quality journalism
Evolve business models to drive sustainable growth
Empower news organizations through technological innovation

Google also said it would put $300 million toward supporting quality journalism and combating misinformation and fake news over the next three years.

Subscribe With Google

Subscribe with Google is a linchpin in that second objective to foster sustainable business models for publishers. The aim is to make it as easy as possible for users to subscribe — particularly on mobile.

For Google account holders that have payment information on file in their accounts, subscriptions can be purchased with a couple of clicks. The user's Google credentials are then used as their login information for their subscriptions. Subscriber information will be turned over to publishers.

Google has been testing this with several publishers, including The Washington Post, which demoed their two-click Subscribe With Google process at the event.

Once a reader signs up with or links their Google account to their subscriptions, they'll be signed in automatically when they are signed in to Google.

"We think that having to log in once can improve the user experiences in a small but important way," said Bonita Stewart, VP of Global Partnerships.

With Subscribe With Google, those who already subscribe to publications will see content from those publications higher in Google search results when they share their subscription status with Google. Stewart was careful to note that the ranking algorithm isn't changing, but that news results from subscribed publications will be inserted in the results subscribers see.

Propensity to Subscribe

A new Propensity to Subscribe signal is in development now with several partners.

Using machine learning, Google aims to help publishers reach site visitors likely to subscribe. For publishers using DoubleClick for Publishers, Google will algorithmically determine when to serve a subscription offer on a publisher's site rather than an ad. Propensity to Subscribe could be rolled out to more publications later this year.

To help identify new prospective audiences, Google also plans to use publishers' audience data to build lookalike audiences for targeting people most likely to subscribe.

New Google Analytics-based Dashboard for Publishers

Additionally, a new News Consumer Insights Dashboard, built on top of Google Analytics, features user engagement data to help publishers understand what is resonating with users and leverage those insights to build readership.

Last fall, Google announced it was ending its First Click Free program and replacing it with Flexible Sampling. The change meant publishers can choose whether and when to show a paywall or subscription prompt to visitors coming from Google Search. Under First Click Free publishers had to allow searchers to access at least three paywalled articles per day for free or be subjected to showing lower in the search results.

[This article originally appeared on Marketing Land.]

About The Author

Ginny Marvin is Third Door Media's Associate Editor, assisting with the day to day editorial operations across all publications and overseeing paid media coverage. Ginny Marvin writes about paid online marketing topics including paid search, paid social, display and retargeting for Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. With more than 15 years of marketing experience, Ginny has held both in-house and agency management positions. She can be found on Twitter as @ginnymarvin.

Let's block ads! (Why?)