Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#261

Post by hackinthebochs » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:49 AM UTC

ehnto wrote: post #245

hackinthebochs wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then why should anyone care about "informed consent" of their "information capital"?

Because the risks involved with complete knowledge of everyone at every moment are huge. Consider that most developed countries have for decades spent millions in spy agencies to get just enough dirt on people of interest to be able to manipulate them. Imagine that the same information is now available on all people to many giant companies, some with almost government like spheres of influence, you can see the potent…

Well I'm paranoid enough to think such possibilities are a problem. But how do you sell those concerns to the average person?

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#262

Post by imron » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:49 AM UTC

Cacti wrote: post #229

photonios wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. People underestimate the amount of data Facebook (and companies alike) can and do scoop up. I’ve seen countless stories supposedly proofing that they’re listening through the microphone. However, most of them can easily be explained away if you consider the vasts amount of data they collect.

The idea that they're listening to your mic is rather ridiculous. I mean, we'd find out eventually, and the consequences of widespread illegal wiretapping would be severe for Facebook, they would really cease to exist. However, as you said, they don't need to. Localization and usage metrics alone can tell you an incredible amount of extremely detailed information.

> the consequences of widespread illegal wiretapping would be severe for Facebook, they would really cease to exist.

Unfortunately, I don't think they would. They'd get a slap on the wrist fine, maybe have one or two senior executives resign, they'd post a mea culpa, saying how they now it was wrong and promise to do better, and then everyone would forget about it a few weeks later when some new thing started to dominate the news cycle.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#263

Post by dantiberian » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:49 AM UTC

user982 wrote: post #217

madeofpalk wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well no, Apple (in an unprecedented move), granted the Uber app the com.apple.private.allow-explicit-graphics-priority entitlement. "Apple gave us this permission because early versions of Apple Watch were unable to adequately handle the level of map rendering in the Uber app," an Uber representative, Melanie Ensign, told Business Insider. "Subsequent updates to Apple Watch and our app removed this dependency, and we…

What is the meaningful difference, in the context of tedunangst's post, between an entitlement that allows surreptitious recording of video and a backdoor that allows surreptitious recording of audio?

I'm 95% sure that there will be an entitlement for recording audio without showing the red mic bar (look at the Phone app), but it won't be a public one. There is no way for a third party app to get past app review with a custom entitlement without explicit permission from Apple. I'd be very surprised if it even passed automated review when the app was uploaded.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#264

Post by imron » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:51 AM UTC

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #146

tfinniga wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your question why privacy is important, or are you thinking of something else?

They have to respect our privacy. The moment they don't, it will cause widespread outrage. Once I realized that, it was hard to think of reasons why their actions are wrong.

> The moment they don't, it will cause widespread outrage.

lol.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#265

Post by patientplatypus » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:52 AM UTC

rickhanlonii wrote: post #103

They're listening, but not to your voice or with a microphone. Facebook is listening to your data--to all of our data, all at once. They have locations, searches, clicks, messaging, photos, hashtags, and any other form of browsing patterns for everyone in your country, everyone in your neighboorhood, everyone in the same room as you. They have enough data with such advanced analysis that on occasion they can get real…

Ummm....https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/79i4cj/youtube_user...

It's a pretty easy test - they just said "cat food" a bunch of times and ads for cat food came up in their feed the next day. I'm sure if you were interested you could probably do the same experiment with some other product you've never posted about or talked about online and come up with similar results. It seems strange that you would just assume that the people who are bringing up this issue are simply misinformed, or do not also know that facebook also looks at other parts of their data. I think most lay people understand how data mining is leveraged these days.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#266

Post by cjbillington » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:53 AM UTC

randycupertino wrote: post #184

austinhutch wrote: post #113

I was skeptical until I experienced an ad in my feed which in my estimation could only attribute to data captured by a conversation had hours earlier. Of course there is the possibility of coincidence but I find it hard to believe. I took advantage of the option to see why I was shown the ad, and was told demographic information, as well as a data partnership with DLX. I would like to know if others who see and ad th…

It did something very similar to me and really made me second guess myself, but there is no other explanation other than it used my microphone to listen to my conversation at work. I felt so paranoid about it and was very weirded out. My backpack zipper broke when I was walking to work. When I arrived at work I told my coworker I needed to buy a new backpack. She and I talked in her office about what type of backpack…

Perhaps your coworker googled about backpacks after the conversation, and facebook knows you spent some time together just before that and put two and two together so to speak.

I'm sure most of the time their algorithms make guesses like that it doesn't result in anything relevant, but you don't notice those ones.

If this cross-referencing of other people's searches is something that they're doing, though, that's concerning too. I don't want my partner to see ads for a gift I'm surprising her with because a facebook algorithm is guessing she might be interested in ads about things I've googled.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#267

Post by j_s » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:54 AM UTC

j_s wrote: post #130

Linking to the discussion that just jumped off the front page for my own benefit when I get back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15580281

Rumors That Facebook Is Secretly Recording You Refuse to Die | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15580281 (Oct 2017 18:20, 80+ comments) http://hnrankings.info/15580281/

Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15581114 (Oct 2017 20:30, 171+ comments) http://hnrankings.info/15581114

Basically the same discussion on separate stories covering the same topic, both on the front page simultaneously. The second only took off after the first was flagged off the page or something.

I didn't want to summon the dupe police before I had a chance to review it a bit closer. Also didn't want to lose both to the flagging committee.

Mostly planning to review participation by various HN users. #facebook #haterade

PS. Neither one is worth an up-vote from me, let alone adding as a favorite!

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#268

Post by imron » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:56 AM UTC

null0pointer wrote: post #227

brad0 wrote: post #97

> "At work, happened to me though earlier this year. Working as a barista, got a burn, talked to my partner in person about it, went to Target, bought the burn cream, and saw an ad on FB for the exact product I purchased. Never searched for product either," wrote Brigitte Bonasoro. Facebook has data sharing agreements with many, many companies. It's most likely that the cream was bought with a card then linked togeth…

I have a similar anecdote. Girlfriend was having some symptoms, we briefly talked about it then walked to the pharmacy and bought a pregnancy test. Maybe 30 minutes after purchasing the test we watched a youtube video on her phone. The ad on the video was for the exact test we bought. I figured that youtube got the credit card info from the purchase but I was shocked at how quickly that translated into something show…

Advertisers are suckers.

Facebook and YouTube are selling ads to people who have already bought their product.

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#269

Post by RoyTyrell » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:58 AM UTC

null0pointer wrote: post #227

brad0 wrote: post #97

> "At work, happened to me though earlier this year. Working as a barista, got a burn, talked to my partner in person about it, went to Target, bought the burn cream, and saw an ad on FB for the exact product I purchased. Never searched for product either," wrote Brigitte Bonasoro. Facebook has data sharing agreements with many, many companies. It's most likely that the cream was bought with a card then linked togeth…

I have a similar anecdote. Girlfriend was having some symptoms, we briefly talked about it then walked to the pharmacy and bought a pregnancy test. Maybe 30 minutes after purchasing the test we watched a youtube video on her phone. The ad on the video was for the exact test we bought. I figured that youtube got the credit card info from the purchase but I was shocked at how quickly that translated into something show…

It's certainly a technical possibility but my bets are on your girlfriend's recent searches. Was the yt video on anything to do with being pregnant?

Was the pharmacy a national chain, regional, local, or one-off?

In my experience in data exchanges with other large companies, data is usually shared and processed in batches where even an hour lag would be considered "very quick".

Re: Facebook denies 'listening' to conversations

#270

Post by macNchz » Mon, Oct 30, 2017, 2:58 AM UTC

underwater wrote: post #199

tfinniga wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, like the example from Target. It is possible that facebook has access to a stream of Target purchases or credit card purchase information. I'd be 0% surprised if there was a data sharing agreement with credit rating companies. Even if they just knew the price of the purchase, combined with the job (burn risk) and location data (traveled from work to nearest store with pharmacy during the day), it's possible th…

I'm sure Facebook would like to do what you're saying, but I think that they're a long way from having those capabilities. They have billions of users, billions of ads, and trillions of pieces of metadata. Sifting through that to produce a guess like "User 1234 burned themselves and would be interested in product 5678" would be an amazing and scary piece of AI. Not to mention that Facebook are limited by the ads they…

I agree that even with an enormous amount of data there are limits to what facebook can realistically infer...I particularly enjoyed the things that facebook’s ad platform determined to be my hobbies when I checked recently: https://m.imgur.com/nWCWn63

I’ve had an account since 2005, even if I use it much less than I used to, you’d think they’d have enough data to do better than that.