HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook • Hacker News Board

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#471

Post by azernik » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:17 AM UTC

jrockway wrote: post #396

dsr_ wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, if you get a radio license and so something illegal with it, that's your fault, and the FCC is the authority that can punish you for it. In this case, just like Facebook. Your responsibility, handed to you with the license, is to not do illegal things, even if people want to pay you money to do it. It's especially bad if you build an automated system that has options for people to do illegal things, since you are…

I'm not sure I agree. If someone buys a radio to transmit illegally, the advertising platform they viewed the ad for the radio on isn't liable, nor is the place they bought it from, nor is the manufacturer or importer. (There is quite the controversy around people buying Baofeng radios to transmit illegally. Amazon is happy to sell you one, no questions asked.) This extends to many areas. Gun manufacturers aren't lia…

The law in question specifically makes the publisher liable. (It has been applied to newspapers in the past.)

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#472

Post by pests » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:17 AM UTC

bonzini wrote: post #458

astura wrote: post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The FHA clearly regulates housing advertising. >>(c) To make, print, or publish, or cause to be made, printed, or published any notice, statement, or advertisement, with respect to the sale or rental of a dwelling that indicates any preference, limitation, or discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, or national origin, or an intention to make any such preference, limitation, or d…

There is no indication of preference/limitation/discrimination in the content that reaches the end user of Facebook.

The lengths at which you are going to rationalize racism just astounds me.

Answer me this. How on Facebook you would expect an excluded person to be able to know about the sale?

They wouldn't. The housing listing doesn't exist for them.

How do you see this as fair?!

I am blown away by all the casual racism all throughout this thread.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#473

Post by blt » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:20 AM UTC

erik_seaberg wrote: post #312

reaperducer wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that easy If a small town newspaper with a staff of 30 can do it, Facebook has both the staff and resources to do the same. If it cannot, or will not, it should not take advertisements for sectors that are regulated.

But small town newspapers are endangered by those costs! Facebook only makes about $6 ARPU. Automating the crap out of everything is what enables them to exist.

cry me a fucking river, Facebook.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#474

Post by jakelazaroff » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:21 AM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #442

jakelazaroff wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people publishing these ads are literally paying Facebook to do so. IANAL but as far as I know it's not legal to profit off illegal activity. Facebook are, themselves, breaking the law here.

What law specifically makes it illegal "to profit off illegal activity"? That sounds incredibly broad and impossible to to avoid.

I imagine you'd be considered an accessory to the act in question. There are also laws like this [1], although they don't apply to this situation.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Son_of_Sam_law

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#475

Post by azernik » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:22 AM UTC

briandear wrote: post #45

austincheney wrote: post #31

Here are the likely relevant laws in question: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Housing_Act * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 By law you cannot discriminate by any designation of protected class, which includes not only parties to a business transaction but also messaging and opportunities there upon. I do understand why Facebook would allow ad display filtering by race and other demographi…

My question would be if an advertiser advertised housing in a demographically targeted publication, for example, a publication focused only on single gay men, if that would necessarily function as discrimination since single mothers wouldn’t be reading that publication, nor those ads. Facebook allows demographic targeting that just happens to be more “effective,” but no more discriminatory that the way conventional t…

As you point out, Facebook targeting is not anything qualitatively new; it's the same old tools, just cheaper and more fine-grained. And the law was written to prevent those same tools from being used to discriminate.

According to Code of Federal Regulations 109, for example, your hypothetical would indeed be discriminatory (https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/DOC_7781.PDF, search for "Selective use of advertising media or content")

Quoting the relevant section:

> The following are examples of the selective use of advertisements which may be discriminatory:

> (a) Selective geographic advertisements. Such selective use may involve the strategic placement of billboards; brochure advertisements distributed within a limited geographic area by hand or in the mail; advertising in particular geographic coverage editions of major metropolitan newspapers or in newspapers of limited circulation which are mainly advertising vehicles for reaching a particular segment of the community; or displays or announcements available only in selected sales offices.

(The rest refer to selective use of the "equal opportunity" slogan and logo, and to selective choice of human models to e.g. exclude children in housing ads.)

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#476

Post by azernik » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:25 AM UTC

dibstern wrote: post #237

dantheman wrote: post #155

A question if you run ads and tune your ad buy to focus on those people with the highest conversion rate. To reduce the amount you're spending by targeting the ads, does this mean that's not allowed? It looks like this is to ensure advertisement reaches all protected categories. Can this mean that one would be forced to advertise in magazines that cater to different audiences? To guarantee a certain subset of the pop…

The issue is not focusing on demographics, it’s excluding demographics. The law states you cannot exclude certain demographics. Facebook is allowing that. Nothing is preventing an atheist from reading a Christian magazine, or some non-expected audience member from reading an ad targeted at a general audience. The problem is when you control the viewers on an individual level, as Facebook does.

Actually, targeting of ads to certain publications is illegal in the field of housing; search for "selective use of advertising media or content" at https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/DOC_7781.PDF

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#477

Post by azernik » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:27 AM UTC

ralusek wrote: post #462

I'm not in the business of defending Facebook, I neither like their business model nor their product...but this is an unreasonable accusation levied against them. Their business is "I know ABCDEF about people, who would you like me to distribute your content to?" Distributing content to people along ABCDE and F demographics happens to be legal in almost every case. The exception is specific housing discrimination law…

The law on housing discrimination is quite clear and even-handed on this topic - ad distributors are liable for discriminatory ads they publish (the law specifically includes "publishes" in the list of criminal verbs, and this was actually enforced in court against the New York Times in the 80s); and selectively-targeted ads are discriminatory (see Code of Federal Regulations section 109.25, down near the bottom of https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/DOC_7781.PDF)

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#478

Post by EdwardDiego » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:35 AM UTC

jahewson wrote: post #369

tekromancr wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The geotargeting polygon was literally RED!?! I can believe that being an oversight, but holy Shit those optics... yikes

For those outside the US who may be wondering why this is so significant: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining

Ah, thank you :)

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#479

Post by downandout » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:39 AM UTC

tekromancr wrote: post #364

samfisher83 wrote: post #49

These are the specific points they are going after: -display housing ads either only to men or women; -not show ads to Facebook users interested in an "assistance dog," "mobility scooter," "accessibility" or "deaf culture"; -not show ads to users whom Facebook categorizes as interested in "child care" or "parenting," or show ads only to users with children above a specified age; -to display/not display ads to users w…

The geotargeting polygon was literally RED!?! I can believe that being an oversight, but holy Shit those optics... yikes

What exactly is wrong with excluding certain areas from seeing your ad? If I'm selling high end jewelry, for example, I don't want my ad shown to people in low income areas, because every click is a waste of money. Similarly, a discount store in a bad part of town may want to exclude wealthy neighborhoods, as people from those neighborhoods are unlikely to come to the store. That doesn't seem like something anyone should be upset about...it's common sense.

I guess it's a little more murky when it comes to housing, but how many people in downtown Watts are going to be legitimate potential leads to rent a house in Beverly Hills? I'm not sure that advertisers should be forced to pay for ads to be shown to people that cannot afford or would otherwise not be interested in what they are trying to sell.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#480

Post by astura » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 9:43 AM UTC

pests wrote: post #472

bonzini wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no indication of preference/limitation/discrimination in the content that reaches the end user of Facebook.

The lengths at which you are going to rationalize racism just astounds me. Answer me this. How on Facebook you would expect an excluded person to be able to know about the sale? They wouldn't. The housing listing doesn't exist for them. How do you see this as fair?! I am blown away by all the casual racism all throughout this thread.

I am convinced half these commenters are just being disingenuous just for the sake of it. These sorts of cases are settled and straightforward, we have a half century of case law plus multiple publications from HUD that directly address this issue. Craigslist actually does an excellent job of summarizing the laws and giving specific examples of illegal advertisements.

https://www.craigslist.org/about/FHA