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"Designed for privacy" Let me guess, instead of broadcasting a textual description of the location and a Facebook URL that's visited if you click the interacti

by m_eiman 11y ago

"Designed for privacy" Let me guess, instead of broadcasting a textual description of the location and a Facebook URL that's visited if you click the interaction button, the beacon contains a URL that's automatically downloaded from Facebook every time you enter the location (presumably to download "up to date and accurate information"). Couldn't find any details on the page though, anyone know?

andreyf 11y ago
The page has enough details to deduce it, I think. My understanding is that the Facebook app will download all of the local ads in the area your phone reports you as being in tied to the beacon ids. Your phone will then display the ads of the beacons it sees nearby. It's actually a bit laudable that they didn't seem to go the route of "report to Facebook all the nearby beacons", although perhaps that's simply not necessary since wifi networks are everywhere and mobile OS'es already do the "heavy lifting" w.r.t. using those for device localization. 1. "The beacons don't [...] change the kind of location information Facebook receives."
- wodenokoto 11y ago
  I thought the beacons would transfer content to the device.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Beacons never do that. They're basically a BLE pinger connected to a battery; their only purpose is to keep broadcasting "HEY THERE MY NAME IS 1234-5678-90AB-CDEF" over 2.4GHz.
IshKebab 11y ago
This will work in a very similar way to iBeacons. Basically BLE beacons can transmit 31 (or 32? I can't remember exactly) bytes of data in their advertisements. Apple uses that to send GUIDs which they look up in their online database. Google uses it in their URIBeacon proof-of-concept to send URIs (but only really really short ones) that then don't depend on an online database of IDs (or rather, it uses the DNS database). Facebook's will use Apple's approach. The beacon transmit's your facebook business ID. The facebook app then looks that up. It is very unlikely that the business will receive any direct information about physical visitors - though facebook probably give them aggregate statistics ("150 people looked at facebook while in your shop this month"). I think facebook's main motivation (other than making Facebook more useful) will be to get this information for themselves so they can improve their advertising targeting (i.e. if you've been to clothes shops, show you clothes adverts). It's probably not that great from a privacy point of view, but I doubt they're doing anything really sinister.
- corin_ 11y ago
  From a privacy point of view it's pretty much taking active "checking in" and making it automated. If you don't mind that then enable the feature in your Facebook app. If you do mind that, then don't (though I guess there's a good chance you're someone who doesn't have a Facebook app installed? "you" the hypothetical reader, not specifically IshKebab)

by m_eiman 11y ago

andreyf 11y ago

The page has enough details to deduce it, I think. My understanding is that the Facebook app will download all of the local ads in the area your phone reports you as being in tied to the beacon ids. Your phone will then display the ads of the beacons it sees nearby. It's actually a bit laudable that they didn't seem to go the route of "report to Facebook all the nearby beacons", although perhaps that's simply not necessary since wifi networks are everywhere and mobile OS'es already do the "heavy lifting" w.r.t. using those for device localization. 1. "The beacons don't [...] change the kind of location information Facebook receives."

wodenokoto 11y ago
I thought the beacons would transfer content to the device.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  Beacons never do that. They're basically a BLE pinger connected to a battery; their only purpose is to keep broadcasting "HEY THERE MY NAME IS 1234-5678-90AB-CDEF" over 2.4GHz.

IshKebab 11y ago

This will work in a very similar way to iBeacons. Basically BLE beacons can transmit 31 (or 32? I can't remember exactly) bytes of data in their advertisements. Apple uses that to send GUIDs which they look up in their online database. Google uses it in their URIBeacon proof-of-concept to send URIs (but only really really short ones) that then don't depend on an online database of IDs (or rather, it uses the DNS database). Facebook's will use Apple's approach. The beacon transmit's your facebook business ID. The facebook app then looks that up. It is very unlikely that the business will receive any direct information about physical visitors - though facebook probably give them aggregate statistics ("150 people looked at facebook while in your shop this month"). I think facebook's main motivation (other than making Facebook more useful) will be to get this information for themselves so they can improve their advertising targeting (i.e. if you've been to clothes shops, show you clothes adverts). It's probably not that great from a privacy point of view, but I doubt they're doing anything really sinister.

corin_ 11y ago
From a privacy point of view it's pretty much taking active "checking in" and making it automated. If you don't mind that then enable the feature in your Facebook app. If you do mind that, then don't (though I guess there's a good chance you're someone who doesn't have a Facebook app installed? "you" the hypothetical reader, not specifically IshKebab)