Facebook Controversy: What to Know About Cambridge Analytica and Your Data
When people use Facebook, large amounts of information including people's name, work history, education history, relationship status networks, every photo and video ever uploaded, every post ever written, every location that the user has been tagged in, and every page and post the users have ever "liked" are volunteered and collected as data. Everything the user has volunteered to Facebook or interacted through Facebook becomes part of their database and can be accessed by developers and targeted by advertisers.
With many apps and websites offering Facebook as a sign in option, detailed information and public profiles can be collected from these apps and website developers. With "permission" from the users and Facebook, these developers can ask for specific information such as the user's friend list, birthday, or political beliefs. They were even allowed to pull detailed information about the user's friends too without permission before 2015. This is how Aleksandr Kogan, a psychology professor at the University of Cambridge, was able to share Facebook user data from his personality-prediction app with other companies including Cambridge Analytica. This data included not only the user's information who downloaded the app, but also 30 different data points about the user's Facebook friends. This issue is what has led to the current Facebook Scandal with Cambridge Analytical.
The realization of this information has led the fear and concern on the amount of data that Facebook collects and how that data is used. Many users feel like this is an invasion of their privacy and even went as far as deleting Facebook. Many celebrities have taken to social media to announce their disappointment in Facebook and even announcing the fact that they will completely abandon the use of the social media outlet all together. This has led to the plummeting of Facebook's market and stocks.
By Priscilla Phuong
When social media first came out, I believe it started with Myspace. I recall the intention of social media was for the general public to have a photo sharing platform with friends and family. Unfortunately advertising and other activities started creeping on the scene. Soon Facebook, another photo sharing website made its debut and the herds of people switched. Myspace became a thing of the past, but greed and competition began to weigh in strong and before people could realized it, Facebook became an advertising platform for many businesses. Fast forward several years and now peoples' photo sharing tools a.k.a Facebook have crossed the line and intruded in people's private lives all to end up in advertisers and other entities hands. This is unacceptable, and Mark the CEO of Facebook should be responsible if any damages result from his scandalous negligence since he had been warned back in 2011 and did absolutely nothing but say "sorry".
ReplyDelete