Facebook Knows If You're Gay, Use Drugs, Or Are a Republican

Hugh Pickens writes writes "Not that there's anything wrong with that — as the Guardian reports that Facebook users are unwittingly revealing their sexual orientation, drug use and political beliefs– using only public 'like' updates. A study of 58,000 Facebook users in the US found that sensitive personal characteristics about people can be accurately inferred from information in the public domain. Researchers were able to accurately infer a Facebook user's race, IQ, sexuality, substance use, personality or political views (PDF) using only a record of the subjects and items they had 'liked' on Facebook – even if users had chosen not to reveal that information. 'It is good that people's behavior is predictable because it means Facebook can suggest very good stories on your news feed,' says Michal Kosinski, 'But what is shocking is that you can use the same data to predict your political views or your sexual orientation. This is something most people don't realize you can do.' For example, researchers were able to predict whether men were homosexual with 88% accuracy by their likes of Facebook pages such as 'Human Rights Campaign' and 'Wicked the Musical' – even if those users had not explicitly shared their sexuality on the site. According to the study other personality traits linked to predictive likes include for High IQ — 'The Godfather,' 'Lord of the Rings,' 'The Daily Show'; for Low IQ — 'Harley Davidson,' 'I Love Being A Mom,' 'Tyler Perry'; and for male heterosexuality — 'Wu Tang Clan,' 'Shaq,' and 'Being Confused after Waking Up from Naps.' Facebook's default privacy settings mean that your 'likes' are public to anyone and Facebook's own algorithms already use these likes to dictate what stories end up in users' news feeds, while advertisers can access them to determine which are the most effective ads to show you as you browse."

Comments

Turns out

[WillgasM]

Turns out, I'm gay. Even Facebook knew it before I did.

Re:Turns out

[Anonymous Coward]

*phew* close call, you could have been a republican!

Re:Turns out

[246o1]

I'd like to see a page about me that says, "Here's the information you've provided, and here's the information we're inferring from what we know about you." I suppose they'd never do that because it might very well creep people out too much, but then, it might get people whose inferences are wrong to directly supply the information to them.

BlueKai does something similar (except it's for a wide range of display advertising, not just facebook) - they infer things about you based on your browsing history and use that to target ads at you. They are all over the web, so they have a good amount of information, but the surprising thing to me is that they let you look at your profile on their website - http://www.bluekai.com/registry/ is the place to find it.

I don't work for BlueKai, or even for a company that uses them.

Re:Turns out

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a Republican Gay Man, you insensitive clod! I oppose gay marriage only because I don't want us homosexuals to have to be as unhappy as you heterosexuals!

Re:Turns out

[Black Parrot]

If he's gay he could well be a closet Republican that's in denial.

Maybe he can be cured of his Republicanism!

They cure Teh Gey with the traditional "laying on of hands". (Presumably if it doesn't give you a boner, they know you're cured.)

Similarly, they cure Teh Republicanism by burying you in money. If it doesn't give you a boner, you're not a Republican anymore.

But

[Master Moose]

The highest intelligence indicator were the users who ignored everything, revealed very little and never "liked" anything - knowing that anything they did on facebook would be mined and used for metrics and marketing.

Re:But

[Anonymous Coward]

Not Intelligent, just paranoid. Kinda like posting anonymously on Slashdot.

Re:But

[rsborg]

Wouldn't the "highest intelligence indicator" be applied to those who don't "do" facebook, twitter, etc?

Or did I just miss something flying over my head?

You aren't missing it, but aren't seeing the totality of Facebook's insidious nature. Now not having a Facebook account is treated by HR departments as suspicious behavior. Also, Facebook made it easy for people to "tag" you - if you don't have an account, you can't repudiate it (or prevent tagging by default). You are literally forced to play their game unless you want your good name being abused. So best move is to have one that's effectively empty, and turn all privacy settings down to the most private.

Of course this defeats the purpose of having a Facebook account - but that's the purpose, right?

Re:But

[Anonymous Coward]

Now not having a Facebook account is treated by HR departments as suspicious behavior.

Frankly, any HR department that really thinks this can go fuck itself with an iron stick.

I think this is a myth the media is pushing to try to get more people on Facebook.

Re:But

[DerekLyons]

The highest intelligence indicator were the people who never joined facebook and want nothing to do with it.

Three quarters of the Mensa members I know use Facebook. I know a lot of *very* smart and intelligent people, and the vast majority of them are on Facebook too.
 
Seriously Slashdot, get the fuck over yourself - this ignorant bias against anyone who uses Facebook doesn't make you intelligent, it makes you look like a jackass.

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[UneducatedSixpack]

One day you will "like" something wrong...

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[CanHasDIY]

Which is why I hit the "like" button for EVERYTHING!!!!!

FYI, I wouldn't recommend drinking from that well, considering how much I piss in it.

Base rates

[jon.willits]

I can do better than 88% accuracy at guessing if people are homosexual by guessing "no" every time.

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[Beardo the Bearded]

You and me both, I've convinced Google that I'm a gay male yoga instructor.

Also, I've been shaving since 2004.

Just The Tip

[Bob9113]

found that sensitive personal characteristics about people can be accurately inferred from information in the public domain.

I've done this stuff, for both ad targeting and music targeting, and I understand the math. Knowing whether you are gay is just the tip of the iceberg.

From the data it can be inferred whether you believe Bradley Manning was justified, whether you think it is treason for a politician to support warrantless surveillance, and whether you believe the "four boxes" epigram is relevant in the current context.

It can be inferred how you react to various turns of phrase, which ways of presenting an idea will ring with you, and therefore how to present a story to you, such that you will be likely to repeat the sound bites on one side of the issue or the other.

They can do this, with an automated system, for hundreds of millions of people -- as can anyone who pays them enough for the data or analysis. It is not a difference in type from what has gone by the name of PR, spin, or handling; but rather a difference of speed, pervasiveness, precision targeting, and potency. It puts more power to distort human perception of reality in the hands of fewer people than ever before -- by orders of magnitude.

The data, once gathered, will remain, and will be packaged and sold, and cracked and siezed, until long after you are dead -- barring some very serious and extremely disruptive counteractivity. It is getting worse every day, and the cost of correcting it is growing exponentially.

Most people don't know it is happening, and most of those who do don't seem to grasp the consequences.

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[ShanghaiBill]

Your analysis of their analysis proves that you can't analyze analyses. Being right 88% of the time means being wrong 12% of the time. It's not special that they aren't right for you.

Also, being "right" 88% of the time is meaningless unless you break out false positives and false negatives. It is estimated that 5-10% of the population is gay. So I could just predict that everyone is straight, and I would be "right" more than 90% of the time.

Re:lotr = high iq?

[Qzukk]

The authors of the study all liked LOTR.

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[pclminion]

The more they mine data, the more they are polishing my turds.

You're just an outlier in the data. Easily identified, easily filtered out...

Coming up with a profile that is completely incorrect and undetectably so is far more difficult than just being random and contradictory.

You should reread that article.

[denzacar]

From TFA:

The Williams Institute found that, overall, an estimated 8.2 percent of the population had engaged in some form same-sex sexual activity. Put another way, 4.7 percent of the population had wandered across the line without coming to think of themselves as either gay or bisexual.

That same study found out that (from the same FA):

just 1.7 percent of Americans between 18 and 44 identify as gay or lesbian, while another 1.8 percent -- predominantly women -- identify as bisexual.

Basically, that "less than 2%" number is the people who think of themselves as being homosexual or bisexual.
8.2% apparently just like having sex with people of the same sex. Clearly, they're not gay.
Cause they don't identify with being gay.
Cause it's all about identifying.

That's why I always identify myself with Superman.

Re:Knows and Presumes are not the same thing

[shikaisi]

If it turns out that, on average, 95% of people who watch Top Gear are heterosexual and 95% of people who watch Glee are homosexual, if I like both it proves absolutely nothing about me.

Except that now we all know you are bisexual.

Denial?

[Comboman]

I'm also a fan of musical theatre, but somehow not gay....wonder how that works?

Denial?