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Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

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Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#31

Post by ben_jones »

mikeash wrote: post #15

It’s trivial to debunk by observing that many people who say they’ve experienced this are using iPhones. On iOS, apps can’t silently use the microphone in the background. A background app using the microphone is always accompanied by a red status bar saying that they’re doing it. This doesn’t show Facebook listening, therefore we can conclude that they’re not, at least on iOS. It’s possible they might be doing it on…

Wasn't there just a story about Apple giving Uber special permissions (which were not turned off after they were no longer needed) so they could do stuff on the Apple watch? Is it that much of a stretch to think they would also give Facebook special permissions?

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#32

Post by maxfurman »

Every one of my friends, including me, has a story about how they used a phrase in conversation that they don't typically say ("Renaissance Faire" in my case, which I have never attended and generally have no interest in), and then seeing an ad for it on either Facebook or Instagram right afterwards. This is purely anecdotal, of course, but it is creepy anyway. The only way to stop this "myth", if it is one, is for Facebook to stop doing whatever it is they do instead of listening to us to get to this unnerving level of targeting.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#33

Post by notatoad »

joshfraser wrote: post #22

I was at lunch with a couple friends and they were making fun of Juicero. I hadn't heard of it at this point. I didn't look it up on my phone, but at least one of my friends did. That afternoon I started seeing Juicero ads non-stop on Facebook. Was Facebook listening or did they connect the dots that my phone was in the same restaurant as friends who were Googling Juicero and figured we had been talking about it? Ano…

>Guess what pops up on Facebook moments later? An ad for Wendys! Were they listening?

If you saw an ad for Wendy's in any other context, would you have been surprised?

I saw an ad for Wendy's shortly before coming to comment on this post. Are HN's advertising algorithms predicting the future, or is it just a coincidence due to the overwhelming volume of fast food advertising?

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#35

Post by FanaHOVA »

joshfraser wrote: post #22

I was at lunch with a couple friends and they were making fun of Juicero. I hadn't heard of it at this point. I didn't look it up on my phone, but at least one of my friends did. That afternoon I started seeing Juicero ads non-stop on Facebook. Was Facebook listening or did they connect the dots that my phone was in the same restaurant as friends who were Googling Juicero and figured we had been talking about it? Ano…

I bet Wendy's also had a billboard on the highway leading to that food desert uh? They know people are on their phones looking for food options (since clearly they aren't easy to find) so they target that area with their ads. It's not that hard.

This is getting similar to horoscopes. When they are wrong, whatever. When they are right, it's "creepy".

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#36

Post by mverwijs »

maxfurman wrote: post #32

Every one of my friends, including me, has a story about how they used a phrase in conversation that they don't typically say ("Renaissance Faire" in my case, which I have never attended and generally have no interest in), and then seeing an ad for it on either Facebook or Instagram right afterwards. This is purely anecdotal, of course, but it is creepy anyway. The only way to stop this "myth", if it is one, is for F…

Alternate explanation: the person(s) you discussed this with did some google'ing and browsing. The tracking cookies do their thing and since you and those persons are linked, you end up with the ads served.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#37

Post by cryoshon »

ricardobeat wrote: post #26

The lack of actual responses to your question here is a bit entertaining. "Of course they are not", "it's not possible", "iOS/Android is safe" etc. Almost like it is offensive to ask. I can't help but remember my incredulous reaction to ECHELON in the 90s and how it turned out to be not just true, but much worse than the original "conspiracy theory". A very relevant example: https://jscholarship.library.jhu.edu/handl…

can't help but agree with you.

people are scrambling to debunk an ill-defined phenomenon that's only exists anecdotally... and in the realm of those who ask "qui bono?"

who benefits if "facebook is listening"? what are the incentives?

the question of technical possibility is the first place people will go to... without realizing that if there is a will, there is a way.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#38

Post by chmike »

Facebook may only need to recognize a few keywords. The one that companies had payed for. It wouldn't be that many. An approximate recognition is good enough. So processing and data transmission could be small.

As long as there is no uncontestable proof, the doubt must benefit Facebook.

The testimonies are not uncontestbale proofs. Considering the million people uisng the facebook app, there will always be a small set of people who will see advertisement of what they just talked about. That is statistic. Some of these, understandably chocked, may be very vocal about it.

We also know that people are payed to spread fake news and manipulate people. So I'm cautious. The truth is unknown, and the longer it takes to get uncontestable proofs, the less credible the listening thesis becomes.

Facebook can't do much appart to let it rain. Open source is the way I would go. That is one way to calm down paranoid or conspirationist people.

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#39

Post by pcl »

I don’t think FB is listening because all the stories I’ve heard can be explained by their graph.

I think it’s hard to debunk because people don’t recognize how powerful their knowledge graph is at this point, and simultaneously underestimate how hard general-purpose speech recognition is, even with studio-level audio setups. And especially to a non-programmer, I think it seems so much easier to just figure out speech recognition than to maintain a huge knowledge graph about billions of people, their connections (explicit and implicit), their current whereabouts, the sites they are visiting, and the text they literally give to Facebook in the form of messages etc. But of course, each one of those things is a tractable problem, and can progress independently of the others, until all of a sudden it’s so good it seems like they must be inside our heads, or at least listening.

But here’s the thing: I think all that big data is actually waaaaay creepier. If they were just listening in and showing relevant ads, that’d be one thing. But instead they have all this data going back years, and can make all these inferences from the data. Just imagine what inferences could be made about non-advertising topics!

Re: Ask HN: Has anyone tried to debunk the myth that Facebook is listening?

#40

Post by cryoshon »

mverwijs wrote: post #36
maxfurman wrote: post #32

Every one of my friends, including me, has a story about how they used a phrase in conversation that they don't typically say ("Renaissance Faire" in my case, which I have never attended and generally have no interest in), and then seeing an ad for it on either Facebook or Instagram right afterwards. This is purely anecdotal, of course, but it is creepy anyway. The only way to stop this "myth", if it is one, is for F…

Alternate explanation: the person(s) you discussed this with did some google'ing and browsing. The tracking cookies do their thing and since you and those persons are linked, you end up with the ads served.

a good alternative hypothesis, but also one that should be proveable, at least in some cases.

designing an experiment to test this would be quite easy.

ultimately your explanation could exist alongside audio snooping, perhaps even helping to resolve areas of ambiguity...

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