7 ms·

Thanks for posting this. When I saw the original FTC story I recalled reading about this once or twice in the past but couldn't think of any key phrases or sour

by AJ007 10y ago

Thanks for posting this. When I saw the original FTC story I recalled reading about this once or twice in the past but couldn't think of any key phrases or sources. In response to some of the other comments here, basically what they are guilty of isn't spying but failing to properly disclose and opt-in users. There is a particular major AV vendor who is selling raw clickstream data of millions of their user's internet usage directly to marketers and other parties right now. As far as I can tell, as long as it is buried somewhere in the terms and conditions no one cares. Of course, other companies that are actually serving the content are doing far more than just passively monitoring your viewing habits. From my best guess, Facebook is logging every signal it can from content/pictures/videos it displays to users. Even if you didn't click like, comment, or click through the link it knows the story captured your attention. I had an interesting case with Instagram where after viewing enough pictures of women's butts it started also showing men's bare butts in my feed too.. at least until I never opened any of them, and they disappeared. Users should consider that content providers are going to have extremely deep data sets of even the most minute dimensions of their political leanings, porn viewing habits, dating preferences, and gullibilities. All of this will make what TV shows you watched between Netflix and NBC beyond mundane. With an open web, where we get content from the source, this shouldn't actually be possible. Thank the platform business model.

mirkules 10y ago
Is it possible to bring about a similar complaint against Facebook with the FTC? Or, if the FTC is the wrong agency, what would be the right one? Of particular concern are "shadow profiles" - dossiers on people who have never even used or consented to using Facebook[1]. I'm no lawyer, but there could be precedent per this Vizio case. In my opinion Facebook is hugely overstepping people's privacy bounds, even if they do bury what they do with some of the data in their terms of service. I never even knew about DeepFace, or mouse cursor movements, or any of the multitudes of violations of privacy outlined in the article below, and frankly it scares me and makes me angry. [1]http://veekaybee.github.io/facebook-is-collecting-this/ http://veekaybee.github.io/facebook-is-collecting-this/
- sogen 10y ago
  crickets
- scient 10y ago
  By using FB, you consent to them using the information about you that others and you yourself provide. Dont like it? Dont use FB.
  - seppin 10y ago
    don't like the single de facto platform for communication online? don't use it. i'm sure your friends will get ahold of you somehow. maybe whatsapp?
    - dpark 10y ago
      On the one hand, Facebook is ubiquitous enough that the government could probably step in and regulate them and it wouldn't be entirely unreasonable. On the other hand, I don't use Facebook and I'm getting along just fine. I have an account but log in about once a year. "Don't use it" is a legitimate option.
  - hedora 10y ago
    They still track you even if you don't have an account. Your friends give them more than enough info for them to create a detailed dossier.
  - bluejekyll 10y ago
    > dossiers on people who have never even used or consented to using Facebook I think you misread the comment. These are people that already don't use Facebook.
  - mirkules 10y ago
    By that logic, we shouldn't buy or use Vizio TVs either. But the issue here with the FTC complaint is that there was not a prominent warning that the data was being collected or used in such a way. I certainly never read or even saw any warning about facial matching in all my photos or my children's photos. Besides all that, people with shadow profiles who never even used Facebook or agreed to their TOS are being tracked. This is not ok. I feel like there is a double standard here: we are vilifying Vizio - a company that has mutliple competitors - for much less wrongdoing than what Facebook is guilty of, even though FB has a de facto monopoly on social networking. Edit: there is a link on the ftc.gov website where you can file a complaint against a company with concerns how it handles your privacy: https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/Company#crnt https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/Company#crnt
FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago
This is why i torrent behind a VPN despite being subscribed to HBO now, Netflix, and Amazon Video. My guilt is ameliorated and at least a sliver of ny privacy is maintained.
- mikeryan 10y ago
  You misunderstand how it works. This worked by fingerprinting audio and video at the TV display level, it's not part of the networking layer. If your content was shown on the TV you could be tracked regardless of source.
  - FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago
    Thanks and noted. If I ever end up getting a SmartTV (due to dumb TV's no longer being sold), it's never getting on my network and going to be banned at the mac address level.
    - z3t4 10y ago
      It needs to be physically disconnected or on a network without Internet connection. The Mac address is the easiest to spoof. If it has any kind of radio like WiFi you need to de-solder it, as the data could be collected by a car driving by, or via your neighborers Wifi.
      - deadbunny 10y ago
        > as the data could be collected by a car driving by, or via your neighborers Wifi. What? How is it going to connect to your neighbours wifi? How is someone driving past going to connect to your TV? Is the TV going to set itself up as an access point? I'm completely behind not connecting random devices in my house to the internet but suggesting they are somehow trying to get data out by connecting to random networks or will just broadcast it for anyone to hear is a bit much.
        codedokode 10y ago
ohyes 10y ago
> I had an interesting case with Instagram where after viewing enough pictures of women's butts it started also showing men's bare butts in my feed too.. at least until I never opened any of them, and they disappeared. This truly is technology run amok. "Welcome to buttstagram, for your butt viewing pleasure." When I think about this situation it makes me want to stay entirely away from social media and off the internet. Yet it's ubiquity in our lives makes it difficult to be integrated and participant in society without the technology. And a lot of the features really do disappear when you remain entirely anonymous (via tor, incognito, not having accounts etc).
- kchoudhu 10y ago
  Wait, what's cloudstagram?
  - forkerenok 10y ago
    That's a very subtle joke :) (Those in the dark search for cloud2butt browser plugin)
    - Fedex 10y ago
      That is my favorite extension. It subtly brightens my day when I come across one of its gems.
- 13of40 10y ago
  I had a similar thing happen a year or two ago: At some point in the past I shut down my Facebook page, but a year later I created a new minimalistic one so I could stay in touch with my family. I posted a picture of a Vespa scooter I'd been restoring in the garage, and suddenly my suggested friends list started overflowing with guys in Indonesian scooter gangs and young asian ladies in head scarfs. (I friended one guy and we exchange "likes" every once in a while but even google translate doesn't understand 3/4 of what he says.)
- a3n 10y ago
  > Yet it's ubiquity in our lives makes it difficult to be integrated and participant in society without the technology. Or: Yet the ubiquity in our lives of Stuff that was never built for us (pretty sure I never gave the billionaires at FB and Goog as much as a single dollar), but merely to lure us, makes it difficult to be integrated with and unwittingly enabling that Stuff without installing and using that Stuff.
hueving 10y ago
>here is a particular major AV vendor who is selling raw clickstream data of millions of their user's internet usage directly to marketers and other parties right now. As far as I can tell, as long as it is buried somewhere in the terms and conditions no one cares. ugh. Name them please! If it's in the ToS they shouldn't mind being called out.
- moonfern 10y ago
  Avast, source https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13079569 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13079569 AJ007 Here are the terms, it's in section 8.Privacy, processing of personal information. https://www.avast.com/eula-avast-free-products https://www.avast.com/eula-avast-free-products However "AVAST may publish or share such information with third parties that are not part of the AVAST Group but will only ever do so after removing personally identifiable information."
  - chinathrow 10y ago
    Also: https://www.pehub.com/2015/05/avast-leads-22-mln-round-for-jumpshot/ https://www.pehub.com/2015/05/avast-leads-22-mln-round-for-j... "Jumpshot also captures https clickstream data to reveal in-depth buying and social behavior above and beyond simple browsing." Capturing https clickstream data is only possible when you MITM the user - see Avast.
    - codedokode 10y ago
      They could make a deal with browser extension developers to bundle a surveillance module. That is why I never install any browser extensions.
      - chinathrow 10y ago
        They could for sure - others already did that and bought well running extensions. https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1vjj51/i_am_one_of_the_developers_of_a_popular_chrome/ https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1vjj51/i_am_one_of_th... At least, not all extension developers gave in to $$$.
yincrash 10y ago
Surveilling users without their knowledge and consent sure sounds like spying to me
underwater 10y ago
Facebook categorises a video view as anything seen for more than three seconds, so draw your own conclusions from that. Instagram was purely chronological until mid way through last year. And it only shows you content you've subscribed to. So it's possible an account you were following changed its posting habits.
xtracto 10y ago
What Facebook is doing is quite frankly scary. This Sunday over a birthday meeting with some friends, one of them was telling us about a restaurant called "Lucuma" (this is in Guadalajara, Mexico). My wife did nothing with her cell-phone, except having it with her during the conversation. Later that day when we are back at home, she showed me an ad about that same restaurant. We never searched for something similar (this is a vegan restaurant), but only talked about it on our way home.
- webXL 10y ago
  The restaurant most likely bought some ads that targeted your wife and your friends' demographic. It's far easier to do that than covertly access your phone's mic.
  - jrockway 10y ago
    It's also possible that the friends saw this ad first, thus planting the idea in the first place.
  - pnutjam 10y ago
    Your wife's friends probably searched it and facebook lumped you all together in their algorithm. Still creepy.
- yaur 10y ago
  Here in NY recording people without their consent is definitely against the law and is likely to piss off important people. As fun as this CT is it seems extraordinarily unlikely that FB employees would risk going to jail for this feature.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

by AJ007 10y ago

mirkules 10y ago

Is it possible to bring about a similar complaint against Facebook with the FTC? Or, if the FTC is the wrong agency, what would be the right one? Of particular concern are "shadow profiles" - dossiers on people who have never even used or consented to using Facebook[1]. I'm no lawyer, but there could be precedent per this Vizio case. In my opinion Facebook is hugely overstepping people's privacy bounds, even if they do bury what they do with some of the data in their terms of service. I never even knew about DeepFace, or mouse cursor movements, or any of the multitudes of violations of privacy outlined in the article below, and frankly it scares me and makes me angry. [1]http://veekaybee.github.io/facebook-is-collecting-this/ http://veekaybee.github.io/facebook-is-collecting-this/

sogen 10y ago
crickets
scient 10y ago
By using FB, you consent to them using the information about you that others and you yourself provide. Dont like it? Dont use FB.
- seppin 10y ago
  don't like the single de facto platform for communication online? don't use it. i'm sure your friends will get ahold of you somehow. maybe whatsapp?
  - dpark 10y ago
    On the one hand, Facebook is ubiquitous enough that the government could probably step in and regulate them and it wouldn't be entirely unreasonable. On the other hand, I don't use Facebook and I'm getting along just fine. I have an account but log in about once a year. "Don't use it" is a legitimate option.
- hedora 10y ago
  They still track you even if you don't have an account. Your friends give them more than enough info for them to create a detailed dossier.
- bluejekyll 10y ago
  > dossiers on people who have never even used or consented to using Facebook I think you misread the comment. These are people that already don't use Facebook.
- mirkules 10y ago
  By that logic, we shouldn't buy or use Vizio TVs either. But the issue here with the FTC complaint is that there was not a prominent warning that the data was being collected or used in such a way. I certainly never read or even saw any warning about facial matching in all my photos or my children's photos. Besides all that, people with shadow profiles who never even used Facebook or agreed to their TOS are being tracked. This is not ok. I feel like there is a double standard here: we are vilifying Vizio - a company that has mutliple competitors - for much less wrongdoing than what Facebook is guilty of, even though FB has a de facto monopoly on social networking. Edit: there is a link on the ftc.gov website where you can file a complaint against a company with concerns how it handles your privacy: https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/Company#crnt https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/Company#crnt

FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago

This is why i torrent behind a VPN despite being subscribed to HBO now, Netflix, and Amazon Video. My guilt is ameliorated and at least a sliver of ny privacy is maintained.

mikeryan 10y ago
You misunderstand how it works. This worked by fingerprinting audio and video at the TV display level, it's not part of the networking layer. If your content was shown on the TV you could be tracked regardless of source.
- FullMtlAlcoholc 10y ago
  Thanks and noted. If I ever end up getting a SmartTV (due to dumb TV's no longer being sold), it's never getting on my network and going to be banned at the mac address level.
  - z3t4 10y ago
    It needs to be physically disconnected or on a network without Internet connection. The Mac address is the easiest to spoof. If it has any kind of radio like WiFi you need to de-solder it, as the data could be collected by a car driving by, or via your neighborers Wifi.
    - deadbunny 10y ago
      > as the data could be collected by a car driving by, or via your neighborers Wifi. What? How is it going to connect to your neighbours wifi? How is someone driving past going to connect to your TV? Is the TV going to set itself up as an access point? I'm completely behind not connecting random devices in my house to the internet but suggesting they are somehow trying to get data out by connecting to random networks or will just broadcast it for anyone to hear is a bit much.
      - codedokode 10y ago

ohyes 10y ago

> I had an interesting case with Instagram where after viewing enough pictures of women's butts it started also showing men's bare butts in my feed too.. at least until I never opened any of them, and they disappeared. This truly is technology run amok. "Welcome to buttstagram, for your butt viewing pleasure." When I think about this situation it makes me want to stay entirely away from social media and off the internet. Yet it's ubiquity in our lives makes it difficult to be integrated and participant in society without the technology. And a lot of the features really do disappear when you remain entirely anonymous (via tor, incognito, not having accounts etc).

kchoudhu 10y ago
Wait, what's cloudstagram?
- forkerenok 10y ago
  That's a very subtle joke :) (Those in the dark search for cloud2butt browser plugin)
  - Fedex 10y ago
    That is my favorite extension. It subtly brightens my day when I come across one of its gems.
13of40 10y ago
I had a similar thing happen a year or two ago: At some point in the past I shut down my Facebook page, but a year later I created a new minimalistic one so I could stay in touch with my family. I posted a picture of a Vespa scooter I'd been restoring in the garage, and suddenly my suggested friends list started overflowing with guys in Indonesian scooter gangs and young asian ladies in head scarfs. (I friended one guy and we exchange "likes" every once in a while but even google translate doesn't understand 3/4 of what he says.)
a3n 10y ago
> Yet it's ubiquity in our lives makes it difficult to be integrated and participant in society without the technology. Or: Yet the ubiquity in our lives of Stuff that was never built for us (pretty sure I never gave the billionaires at FB and Goog as much as a single dollar), but merely to lure us, makes it difficult to be integrated with and unwittingly enabling that Stuff without installing and using that Stuff.

hueving 10y ago

>here is a particular major AV vendor who is selling raw clickstream data of millions of their user's internet usage directly to marketers and other parties right now. As far as I can tell, as long as it is buried somewhere in the terms and conditions no one cares. ugh. Name them please! If it's in the ToS they shouldn't mind being called out.

moonfern 10y ago
Avast, source https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13079569 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13079569 AJ007 Here are the terms, it's in section 8.Privacy, processing of personal information. https://www.avast.com/eula-avast-free-products https://www.avast.com/eula-avast-free-products However "AVAST may publish or share such information with third parties that are not part of the AVAST Group but will only ever do so after removing personally identifiable information."
- chinathrow 10y ago
  Also: https://www.pehub.com/2015/05/avast-leads-22-mln-round-for-jumpshot/ https://www.pehub.com/2015/05/avast-leads-22-mln-round-for-j... "Jumpshot also captures https clickstream data to reveal in-depth buying and social behavior above and beyond simple browsing." Capturing https clickstream data is only possible when you MITM the user - see Avast.
  - codedokode 10y ago
    They could make a deal with browser extension developers to bundle a surveillance module. That is why I never install any browser extensions.
    - chinathrow 10y ago
      They could for sure - others already did that and bought well running extensions. https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1vjj51/i_am_one_of_the_developers_of_a_popular_chrome/ https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1vjj51/i_am_one_of_th... At least, not all extension developers gave in to $$$.

yincrash 10y ago

Surveilling users without their knowledge and consent sure sounds like spying to me

underwater 10y ago

Facebook categorises a video view as anything seen for more than three seconds, so draw your own conclusions from that. Instagram was purely chronological until mid way through last year. And it only shows you content you've subscribed to. So it's possible an account you were following changed its posting habits.

xtracto 10y ago

What Facebook is doing is quite frankly scary. This Sunday over a birthday meeting with some friends, one of them was telling us about a restaurant called "Lucuma" (this is in Guadalajara, Mexico). My wife did nothing with her cell-phone, except having it with her during the conversation. Later that day when we are back at home, she showed me an ad about that same restaurant. We never searched for something similar (this is a vegan restaurant), but only talked about it on our way home.

webXL 10y ago
The restaurant most likely bought some ads that targeted your wife and your friends' demographic. It's far easier to do that than covertly access your phone's mic.
- jrockway 10y ago
  It's also possible that the friends saw this ad first, thus planting the idea in the first place.
- pnutjam 10y ago
  Your wife's friends probably searched it and facebook lumped you all together in their algorithm. Still creepy.
yaur 10y ago
Here in NY recording people without their consent is definitely against the law and is likely to piss off important people. As fun as this CT is it seems extraordinarily unlikely that FB employees would risk going to jail for this feature.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]