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>Still, I have never had the data I've given them come back to haunt me. Are you sure? Facebook has a patent on lowering your credit score based on who is in y

>Still, I have never had the data I've given them come back to haunt me. Are you sure? Facebook has a patent on lowering your credit score based on who is in your friends list[1]. They also feed data to credit score companies who directly examine your posts and use it to tweak your credit score yet further[2]. It's totally possible that your use of Facebook has affected your ability to buy a car or house, or get a job[3]. The lifetime cost of your mortgage could be $20,000 higher than it need be due to your use of Facebook. Maybe you got passed over for that job that would have been in the perfect place for raising your new child, due to your posting. How would you know? Did you really think they were going to tell you? Maybe you're not at a time in your life where these things have happened to you yet, but I have bad news. The data you've submitted to Facebook will never be deleted. It's invisible baggage, following you everywhere. Honestly, you have no real idea of what impact it's having on your life, because it's not in the interest of any of that data's consumers to tell you what they are doing with it. [1] https://qz.com/472751/facebooks-new-patent-lets-lenders-reject-a-loan-based-on-your-friends-credit-scores-but-dont-freak-out/ https://qz.com/472751/facebooks-new-patent-lets-lenders-reje... [2] http://www.ajc.com/news/national/how-your-facebook-profile-can-affect-your-credit/dGASsQw6MBsxjspFdzwoZK/ http://www.ajc.com/news/national/how-your-facebook-profile-c... [3] https://www.creditkarma.com/article/why-some-employers-check-credit-history-1014152 https://www.creditkarma.com/article/why-some-employers-check...

aianus 10y ago
> The lifetime cost of your mortgage could be $20,000 higher than it need be due to your use of Facebook. Or it could be $20,000 cheaper if you're actually low-risk and their algorithms are better than the status quo... > Maybe you got passed over for that job that would have been in the perfect place for raising your new child, due to your posting. How would you know? If you didn't have Facebook, how would you know if you were missing out on opportunities because you've since lost touch with various acquaintances?
- Sir_Substance 10y ago
  >Or it could be $20,000 cheaper if you're actually low-risk and their algorithms are better than the status quo... I'm sorry, are we now living on bizarro-earth where companies work with each other to develop new, exciting opportunities to make less money?
  - mason55 10y ago
    Yes, it's one of the tenets of capitalism. Competition results in lower prices.
    - Sir_Substance 10y ago
      Most of the US banking sector is owned by a small number of companies[1]. Now I don't live in the USA so I can't speak for the USA in particular. However, I have lived in Australia, where the banking competition is so bad that the consumer protection agency is having to explain in baby words to the national banks why they can't gang up on apple pay[2]. I have also lived in Iceland, a nation in which essentially all industries exist in tiny vertical monopolies, and the banks are no exception. It's hard to link citations here because fólk lesa ekki Íslensku[6][7], but go ask an Icelander if they think the national banks are in vigorous competition, they'll laugh in your face. Landsbankinn was genuinely shocked and puzzled when I moved all my accounts to Arion because they wouldn't give me a visa electron card so I could buy things off the internet. That having been said, some quick[3] googling[4] suggests[5] that the USA isn't in great shape when it comes to competition either. In general, consumer competition is poor among banks, and they like it that way. [1] https://hbr.org/2016/06/one-big-reason-theres-so-little-competition-among-u-s-banks https://hbr.org/2016/06/one-big-reason-theres-so-little-comp... [2] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-30/accc-rejects-the-banks-colluding-to-bargain-on-apple-pay/8078944 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-30/accc-rejects-the-banks... [3] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/five-major-banks-agree-parent-level-guilty-pleas https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/five-major-banks-agree-parent... [4] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-banks-rigging-lawsuit-idUSKCN0Y932L http://www.reuters.com/article/us-banks-rigging-lawsuit-idUS... [5] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-05/banks-said-to-face-sec-probe-into-possible-credit-swap-collusion https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-05/banks-sai... [6] no one reads Icelandic [7] please critique my grammar, I'm guessing here :(
Godel_unicode 10y ago
I personally know several people who got jobs because an acquaintance posted on Facebook.
lisper 10y ago
> It's totally possible that your use of Facebook has affected The really scary possibility is that your non-use of Facebook has negatively impacted your credit score. My (mostly) non-use of LinkedIn (which is even worse than FB IMHO) has almost certainly had a negative impact on my career.
- Sir_Substance 10y ago
  It's definitely something I have a serious concern over. I also have serious concerns about certain types of personal account being required for employment. I have personal microsoft, github and google accounts that I don't want, but had to create because I had to access msdn/github/google cloud console or I would not be employable. None of them provide a mechanism where my employer can open an account under the name of the company (so I bear no liability), bestow it upon me as a work asset, and then revoke it when I leave. AWS provides this in the form of access keys which are god damn great, but they're an exception. At some point, we will have to start auditing and regulating the responsibility that companies owe to society once they come to dominate a field. There's a scary chance that LinkedIn might capture almost all the professional job market. Once that happens, we /need/ to be able to audit them to ensure they are fully complying with witness protection requirements, and to make sure their algorithms don't contain race biases. Look forward to that one being the hot topic of 2025's legal circles.
zeroer 10y ago
Credit scores are percentiles. It's mathematically impossible for the effect of taking an attribute into account to only lower sores or leave them the same. So, you could just as easily have said that they raise scores based on who is or is not in your friends list.

aianus 10y ago

> The lifetime cost of your mortgage could be $20,000 higher than it need be due to your use of Facebook. Or it could be $20,000 cheaper if you're actually low-risk and their algorithms are better than the status quo... > Maybe you got passed over for that job that would have been in the perfect place for raising your new child, due to your posting. How would you know? If you didn't have Facebook, how would you know if you were missing out on opportunities because you've since lost touch with various acquaintances?

Sir_Substance 10y ago
>Or it could be $20,000 cheaper if you're actually low-risk and their algorithms are better than the status quo... I'm sorry, are we now living on bizarro-earth where companies work with each other to develop new, exciting opportunities to make less money?
- mason55 10y ago
  Yes, it's one of the tenets of capitalism. Competition results in lower prices.
  - Sir_Substance 10y ago
    Most of the US banking sector is owned by a small number of companies[1]. Now I don't live in the USA so I can't speak for the USA in particular. However, I have lived in Australia, where the banking competition is so bad that the consumer protection agency is having to explain in baby words to the national banks why they can't gang up on apple pay[2]. I have also lived in Iceland, a nation in which essentially all industries exist in tiny vertical monopolies, and the banks are no exception. It's hard to link citations here because fólk lesa ekki Íslensku[6][7], but go ask an Icelander if they think the national banks are in vigorous competition, they'll laugh in your face. Landsbankinn was genuinely shocked and puzzled when I moved all my accounts to Arion because they wouldn't give me a visa electron card so I could buy things off the internet. That having been said, some quick[3] googling[4] suggests[5] that the USA isn't in great shape when it comes to competition either. In general, consumer competition is poor among banks, and they like it that way. [1] https://hbr.org/2016/06/one-big-reason-theres-so-little-competition-among-u-s-banks https://hbr.org/2016/06/one-big-reason-theres-so-little-comp... [2] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-30/accc-rejects-the-banks-colluding-to-bargain-on-apple-pay/8078944 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-30/accc-rejects-the-banks... [3] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/five-major-banks-agree-parent-level-guilty-pleas https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/five-major-banks-agree-parent... [4] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-banks-rigging-lawsuit-idUSKCN0Y932L http://www.reuters.com/article/us-banks-rigging-lawsuit-idUS... [5] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-05/banks-said-to-face-sec-probe-into-possible-credit-swap-collusion https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-05/banks-sai... [6] no one reads Icelandic [7] please critique my grammar, I'm guessing here :(

Godel_unicode 10y ago

I personally know several people who got jobs because an acquaintance posted on Facebook.

lisper 10y ago

> It's totally possible that your use of Facebook has affected The really scary possibility is that your non-use of Facebook has negatively impacted your credit score. My (mostly) non-use of LinkedIn (which is even worse than FB IMHO) has almost certainly had a negative impact on my career.

Sir_Substance 10y ago
It's definitely something I have a serious concern over. I also have serious concerns about certain types of personal account being required for employment. I have personal microsoft, github and google accounts that I don't want, but had to create because I had to access msdn/github/google cloud console or I would not be employable. None of them provide a mechanism where my employer can open an account under the name of the company (so I bear no liability), bestow it upon me as a work asset, and then revoke it when I leave. AWS provides this in the form of access keys which are god damn great, but they're an exception. At some point, we will have to start auditing and regulating the responsibility that companies owe to society once they come to dominate a field. There's a scary chance that LinkedIn might capture almost all the professional job market. Once that happens, we /need/ to be able to audit them to ensure they are fully complying with witness protection requirements, and to make sure their algorithms don't contain race biases. Look forward to that one being the hot topic of 2025's legal circles.

zeroer 10y ago

Credit scores are percentiles. It's mathematically impossible for the effect of taking an attribute into account to only lower sores or leave them the same. So, you could just as easily have said that they raise scores based on who is or is not in your friends list.