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Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

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Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#381

Post by nexuist »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #265
newswasboring wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand you have used Occam's razor to come to this conclusion. And its a perfectly valid point. But, this particular story has been repeated so many times around me that I am genuinely suspicious. But alas, the only way to know would be to look at the code. And even then we might not understand because its a blackbox type system which is ill understood by even its designers.

It's actually possible to evoke some interesting responses from the algorithms by reducing the amount of data input. For example: When I set up a new facebook account for my mother (at her explicit wish), she had no friends or interests marked yet. Facebook showed her some random ads and posts. During the setup I was scrolling through her timeline and my phone beeped so I stopped scrolling for about 2 seconds. The po…

> So evidently it even looks at how long you look at certain content

It does. Instagram constantly sends back telemetry including your scroll position, which can then be used to determine what you were looking at and for how long. Scroll right past an ad? you probably won't see it again; the algorithm knows it didn't have an impact on you. Meanwhile, spend a few seconds reading what it says, and this teaches the algorithm that you are interested in similar content.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#382

Post by reaperducer »

continuations wrote: post #297
jonahbenton wrote: post #205

Not coincidence. Not "bank purchase history" shared with google- in most cases banks and credit cards don't know item level detail. Lots of ways this data flow could happen, at least in the US. Happy to go through specific details I have seen if you want to share more about this, but two high level points 1. Remember that when you purchase something, the data about the purchase is BOTH yours AND the entity from whom…

How does Google link the real life person who bought Voltaren at a store to the online account or fingerprint that browses the Internet?

How does Google link the real life person who bought Voltaren at a store to the online account or fingerprint that browses the Internet?

Often, through the payment.

People use the same payment methods in the same stores over and over. This data is accumulated by the stores, and sold. if you signed up for a "points card" or some other gimmick to get 2¢ off something, the personal information you used when you signed up is added to the profile.

What you bought in the store is added to your profile (within legal limits in certain jurisdictions).

Some stores have devices that listen to your mobile phone's identifiers (wifi, Bluetooth, etc) and add that to your profile. Now the data profilers know what other stores you shop in. Some stores are experimenting with facial recognition (Walgreens). That gets added to your profile.

If you go to several in a single day, your route between the stores can be guessed. If you go to one or more places (stores, parking garages, streets that pass parking lots) that have sensors that read the NFC chips in your car's tires, then that can be added to your profile.

Now they know everywhere you go, everywhere you shop, everything you buy, how much you buy, how much you spend, your race, your gender, how you dress, what brands are displayed on your clothing, and any visible hair, moles, or tattoos.

That's just off the top of my head.

And people wonder, "Wow. I am a little scruffy. How did Facebook know to show me an ad for a razor?"

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#383

Post by another-dave »

snowwrestler wrote: post #169
bladewolf47 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if it fits with what the poster you replied to was saying but I find it a bit curious when I buy say a guitar on Amazon and my recommendations (emails or ads in other sites) over the next few days are still guitars. I do not remember seeing one of those promotions which follow a purchase being about accessories or add-ons.

No automated recommendation system is going to be perfect; it’s either going to over-recommend or under-recommend. From the way the Amazon system works, we can infer that they have decided that missing to the over-recommend side is a better business strategy than missing under. And it kind of makes sense if you think about it... really, what are the consequences of seeing these silly over-recommendations? Did you sto…

> I bet the vast majority of people shrug or laugh, but don’t change habits.

Or you tell all your friends about it and end up having a conversation about guitars/dishwashers or whatever.

It may not be intentional on their part, but spin off conversations can be a nice by-product for them. Feels like it helps it stick in the mind, a bit like writing a witty TV ad.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#385

Post by hansel_der »

JustFinishedBSG wrote: post #291
beervirus wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably that data would include time, amount, and vendor... but not item-level details. Right? There's something else going on here.

Drugs often cost a very specific amount of money (When I buy drugs it's always something like 4.86e or whatever, not neat 4.99) so I assume it's easy to de-anonymize

> neat 4.99

i get what you are saying, but calling a price ending in .99 "neat" feels very wrong

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#386

Post by kennywinker »

beowulfey wrote: post #362
inetknght wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Marketing is a legitimate business reason. Pervasive targeted marketing is not a legitimate business reason.

On the contrary, pervasive targeted marketing is exactly a legitimate business reason in the context of increasing revenue efficiently, as most corporations want to do.

Selling cocaine is a great way to efficiently increase revenue, but it's not a legitimate way

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#387

Post by edoceo »

anigbrowl wrote: post #380
edoceo wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why use a word with a known definition to try to mean the near opposite? its confusing. if you think the thing sucks, just say it sucks.

Many words have multiple definitions, as you are surely aware. Legitimate is one of them.

yep, all the definitions of legitimate equivocate it to legal/lawful.

except here, y'all want it to mean not-lawful.

I'm legitimately not smart enough to continue this conversation.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#388

Post by jeroenhd »

pc86 wrote: post #137
jeroenhd wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels like it should be illegal if it isn't already.

Why? I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm actually inclined to agree. But this hand-wavy "this should be illegal!" type of comment is extremely common on these threads and is completely unhelpful.

All uninformed data sales feel icky to me, but data sales that involve actual payment history even more so. There's incredible amounts of personal information int he stuff you buy for your day to day life, ranging from religious items to medicine, and coupled with an account from a party like Google or Facebook, this pretty much completely deanonimises the otherwise anonimisable internet profile.

You can get a new internet provider and a new Gmail account, but your purchasing habits won't change and are easily mined. A real-life connection between an online account and the stuff you buy in physical stores crosses a boundary that I think should not be crossed

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#389

Post by nemothekid »

kennywinker wrote: post #386
beowulfey wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the contrary, pervasive targeted marketing is exactly a legitimate business reason in the context of increasing revenue efficiently, as most corporations want to do.

Selling cocaine is a great way to efficiently increase revenue, but it's not a legitimate way

Selling cocaine is a legitimate way to increase revenue. If the cocaine is real (i.e you aren't selling flour) then why wouldn't it be legitimate?

It might not be legal, but CocaCola is allowed to import coca leaves by the millions.

Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?

#390

Post by zubi »

bellyfullofbac wrote: post #358
zubi wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a response to those who asked questions here in the comments: When I finally overcame the shock, the very first thing I did was to ask her if she, or a guest, indeed searched for, or otherwise "input" anything related to usb-sticks or water-proofness into a computer system. The answer was no. I don't know what to make of it. I don't want to succumb to conspiracy theories of the sort that ambient sound is recorded…

An explanation would be that, in the beginning of Covid, your scenario (needing washable USB sticks) happened to many many people.

Excellent reasoning. I never thought of this but very plausible indeed.
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