Facebook's sentiment analysis understands the emotions of vulnerable teens and and is giving that data to advertisers to help understand market segments.
The average social media user would be forgiven for thinking that Facebook’s data scandal had come seemingly out of nowhere. There were security warnings from industry experts dating as far back as 2013. Using one of the APIs, a loophole reported in 2015 allows hackers to gather millions of personal data from Facebook.
The Facebook Cambridge Analytica data scandal has garnered attention worldwide for helping to spotlight a very real problem with data privacy on the Internet. CPO Magazine will be providing ongoing coverage as we believe this to be a pivotal moment which will shape the future of how tech companies use consumer data.
No matter what future laws and regulations are imposed on Facebook, there will never be a law against storing customer data for in-company purposes. Facebook got in hot water for allowing tactics that manipulated elections. The 2056 presidential campaign could be entirely run online where Facebook likes replace votes.
Whether you are a user or not, you have a relationship with Facebook. With the latest revelations of the Cambridge Analytica "breach", it is becoming more and more obvious that whether you like it or not, your data will be harvested – and “sold”. Privacy choice and control is no longer fully in your hands.
Of all the legislation currently on the horizon, the Honest Ads Act seems to have the best chance of passage. The legislation is easy to understand and has bilateral support as well as the tacit support of Facebook, which is under pressure to show that it is changing and has the best interests of users at heart.
As much as Facebook would like to sweep the Cambridge Analytica data scandal under the rug, signs continue to mount that the company is still playing fast and loose with user data. All this raises the question of whether the 2011 FTC settlement that resulted in an 8-count consent decree actually went far enough.
Companies, and even entire industries, are more afraid of Wall Street than they are of Washington. Instead of Facebook’s stock falling on privacy concerns, it is actually rising. Facebook has sensed that Wall Street doesn’t really care about privacy, and as long as Wall Street doesn’t care about privacy, why should it?
After nearly two months of non-stop controversy and scandal over its improper use of Facebook data, Cambridge Analytica finally announced that it was ceasing operations, effective immediately. In doing so, Cambridge Analytica has become the new poster child to highlight the perils of data security breaches.
In an effort to get out in front of the data privacy scandal threatening to engulf the company, Facebook recently announced a new data abuse bounty program, which promises to pay people who report data abuses. But is this new data abuse bounty program going to result in any real changes to data privacy on Facebook?
