Slashdot Mirror
Zuckerberg: Facebook Doesn't Use Your Mic For Ad Targeting (engadget.com)
During today's joint hearing before the Senate Judiciary and Commerce Committees, CEO Mark Zuckerberg fully denied the idea that Facebook listens in on your conversations via microphones to display relevant ads. Engadget reports: Senator Gary Peters (D-MI) asked him to answer "yes or no" whether Facebook used audio from personal devices to fill out its ad data, and Zuckerberg said no. The CEO explained that users can upload videos with audio in them, but not the kind of background spying that you've probably heard people talk about. Peters: "I have heard constituents say Facebook is mining audio from their mobile devices for the purpose of ad targeting. This speaks to the lack of trust we are seeing. I understand there are technical and logistical issues for that to happen. For the record, I hear it all the time, does Facebook use audio obtained from mobile devices to enrich personal information about its users?"
Zuckerberg: "We do not. Senator, Let me be clear on this. You are talking about the conspiracy theory passed around that we listen to what is going on on your microphone and use that. We do not do that. We do allow people to take videos on their device and share those. Videos also have audio. We do, while you are taking a video, record that and use that to make the service better by making sure that you have audio. That is pretty clear."
Zuckerberg: "We do not. Senator, Let me be clear on this. You are talking about the conspiracy theory passed around that we listen to what is going on on your microphone and use that. We do not do that. We do allow people to take videos on their device and share those. Videos also have audio. We do, while you are taking a video, record that and use that to make the service better by making sure that you have audio. That is pretty clear."
"We do, while you are taking a video, record that and use that to make the service better by making sure that you have audio. That is pretty clear"
Not clear at all.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
They use it for other undisclosed purposes.
The whole concept of facebook... using your real name... instant fail.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
The difference is maybe that the data breech in those other cases was a damage to the ones losing the data, too, while Facebook's very business model is based on doing just what happened.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Zuck totally owned most of the Senators. Was not expecting that.
Number of lazy, repeat and "I'm a total dumb fuck" questions by people who could not be bothered to research issues in advance dominated the hearing.
Most amazing question was from Ted Cruz about the Palmer Lucky firing. It made the whole thing worth listening to. Had to rewind and play it back I was laughing so hard.
With runners up incompetently hitting on the cross site tracking dimensions and lost opportunities to expose Zucks phony ignorance on the subject. Someone I don't remember who did kind of get him to admit it but in an overly generous way.
On Microphone targeting the obvious follow up questions about data provided by third parties were never broached.
It never occurred to anyone to ask about end users ability to control and view data obtained by Facebook from third parties that work quite a bit differently from Zucks claims about "their data".
Zero questions on shadow profiles and tracking of people who don't even use the service.
No pushback on magical "AI" claims vs. thinking human adversaries. Apparently Zuck thinks AGI is 5 years out or he's full of shit. Either way he's full of shit.
Surprisingly there were people concerned with censorship aspects of the "hate speech" banning and calling out of cowards who think the first amendment is dangerous.
Was also impressed with TIA mention (How Zuck could never have heard of TIA strains any and all credibility) This business of government asking for social media handles for Visa applications and government asking for data was nice to get on record. However the obvious "third party doctrine" related issues were predictable never followed up on.
In all the Senate gets a D+ for dressing themselves and showing up.
> Congress is toothless and Zuckerberg knows it.
Congress has teeth if it wants to act. Choosing not to bite is not the same as not having teeth.
It's more spineless, or maybe coopted or corrupt. In principle, if enough of us motivate them, they could act in our interests.
Do people actually think they're analysing the audio streams of every device waiting for people to say certain words/products so they can advertise that back to them? Real time analysis of millions of audio streams in many languages/accents? Yeah right.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
Dear Zuckerberg, is Facebook scraping data from other sources using my mic on my tablet to target ads for my profile?
Honestly, I don't think they are. I think the truth is much worse and embarrassing.
There are people in this topic that **insist** this has happened to them. I think that, in each and every one of those cases, those persons (or their known close relations) fed just enough data to facebook so that it can occasionally get a really good target.
Has your significant other ever called you out over subtly reacting to something emotionally, and you thought you had a perfect poker face? Your partner knows you so well that they can read you... sometimes before you realize how you're actually feeling.
The truth is, Facebook has so much data on you, they can predict what ads to target to you. It seems like magic, so people blame secret recording. But, no, it's just that people have shoveled so much data into facebook that it can get targeted hits. Facebook -- a data aggregation and ad company -- is doing this, and somehow people are shocked that they get it eerily right sometimes?
But that truth is too embarrassing. Embarrassing to the person who willingly gave away all that data for free, and embarrassing to facebook haters that facebook is actually really, REALLY good at its mission. So we end up getting conspiracy theories that they're listening all the time.
No, dumbshits. They're not secretly listening. You're just willingly giving them everything they need.