HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook • Hacker News Board

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#491

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 10:49 AM UTC

bardworx wrote: post #486

eahman00 wrote: post #484

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sorry, our site is unavailable in your country right now." In any case I suppose it's a cultural thing. I've seen in the US they have ads for really invasive drugs on the telly, so I suppose Americans visit pharmacies all the time, that's why they became convenience stores? Or maybe the other way around, they are convenience stores so they can get Americans to buy drugs more often? Anyway, offtopic.

In search of continues growth, pharmacies in the US had to expand their offerings. Since someone will go there to get their prescription filled or pick up some Asprin, it makes sense to start selling vitamins, then some household essentials, and before you know it Walgreens is selling fruits and veggies. Pictures being printed in pharmacies have been around since 90s, at least.

[deleted]

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#492

Post by scarface74 » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 10:55 AM UTC

phy6 wrote: post #445

scarface74 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can target whoever you want to in traditional media. With traditional media for instance, you can target off campus housing to a majority White college,but there is no way that you can stop a minority from seeing the ads. With FB, you could target an ad to people who go to that school who are of certain race. ( https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/609543/faceboo... ) This is specifically not allowed by t…

Devils advocate here, but what if facebook had an Opt-In, where users can allow the features they've entered to limit the ads shown to them? What if I only want ads (from food to housing) in Spanish or Chinese? Can my preference as an individual override having to see ads that I don't want to see?

It doesn’t matter and the law only applies to housing. All of the other analogies are moot.

If you asked a real estate agent could they find you a house in a mostly Jewish community for instance, they are not allowed to help you...

https://realestate.usnews.com/real-estate/articles/what-your...

Real estate agents can easily find themselves having to explain why they can’t narrow down homes on the market based on the client’s preferences because the requests touch on the protected classes. Babs De Lay, broker and owner of Urban Utah Homes and Estates real estate agency in Salt Lake City, says she worked with friends a few years ago who said they were looking for the “most Jewish, democratic neighborhood” in the area.

You could ask your real estate agent, “Is this a good neighborhood?”

Your agent isn't purposely giving you the run-around. Certain details about a neighborhood or community can violate the Fair Housing Act, which was enacted in 1968 to eliminate housing discrimination. The law protects against discrimination based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability or family status. In particular, it prohibits any real estate professional from steering prospective homebuyers or renters toward or away from a community based on any of the classes under federal protection.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#493

Post by TangoTrotFox » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:06 AM UTC

burkaman wrote: post #103

TangoTrotFox wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks like if this goes to trial it's all going to hinge on exactly what "To publish an advertisement, with respect to the sale or rental of a dwelling, with an intention to make a preference based on race, color, ..." means. To me that seems quite clearly to refer to the ad itself - that the ad cannot make a preference, implicitly or explicitly, for any group. However, who the ad is shown to would seem to be another…

Yes, your examples are potentially unlawful. See HUD's guidelines here: https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/DOC_7781.PDF > § 109.25 Selective use of advertising media or content. > (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 geographi…

You can't conflate issues here. There are two major questions in play:

1) Is it unlawful for the advertiser to publish advertisements that may result in an individual selectively advertising? There seems to be no law or guidance even suggesting that the answer is yes here. For instance, under your guidance the billboard owner (who then rents it to the advertiser) would not be liable for not ensuring that the advertiser was advertising in a sufficiently broad, or random, variety of locations to fulfill the legal regulations. Facebook in this case is not the person placing the advertisements - but the venue of advertisement.

2) Is it unlawful for a person to advertise without complete demographic representation? This is not what this case is about, though it's an interesting question. The HUD's guidance makes this quite clear though, like you mention, that is guidance from the HUD and not necessarily the law itself. Government agencies tend to take very broad positions on laws, but these interpretations do not always hold up in the courts. It would be interesting to see how this point is argued from both sides, though this is a tangential issue.

This case is quite peculiar though since the HUD release seems to be building a case based on #2, yet targeting a defendant was would be implied from #1. This seems highly inconsistent, so again - it should be very interesting to see how this case develops.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#494

Post by sorokod » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:15 AM UTC

matchagaucho wrote: post #307

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…

How much of the responsibility falls on the Landlord, given they created the targeted ad segments? It's not like the Facebook Ad Manager has a guided wizard for the real estate industry to target prospective tenants.

It is not like there is a physical law of responsibility conservation. Multiple entities can carry 100% responsibility.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#495

Post by ajdlinux » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:16 AM UTC

eahman00 wrote: post #484

Zarel wrote: post #482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US and many other countries (I can confirm this is true for Japan), pharmacies are also convenience stores, and sell many other things besides drugs. https://www.cvs.com/ For instance, here's a US pharmacy chain – notice it mentions photos on the home page.

"Sorry, our site is unavailable in your country right now." In any case I suppose it's a cultural thing. I've seen in the US they have ads for really invasive drugs on the telly, so I suppose Americans visit pharmacies all the time, that's why they became convenience stores? Or maybe the other way around, they are convenience stores so they can get Americans to buy drugs more often? Anyway, offtopic.

In Australia, we don't have the same culture of pharmacies being convenience stores as in the US (and certainly not selling cigarettes!), or the same issues with prescription drugs (it's illegal to advertise them here like in most places), but pharmacies regularly dedicate half of their floor space on cosmetics, and it's not uncommon to have photo printing machines too - back in the days of film cameras, the pharmacy was where we would drop off film rolls for developing.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#496

Post by austhrow743 » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:20 AM UTC

philipov wrote: post #177

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> draw a red line around zip codes and then not display ads to Facebook users who live in specific zip codes. This is actually somewhat odd in this context. Obviously if you're advertising housing in Boston you don't want to be advertising it to people in Washington or China, or probably even Springfield. So you need some way to specify a set of regions and zip code is the obvious way of doing that.

No, specifying individual zip codes sounds like the worst way to do that. The obvious way is to have a max distance slider.

That's far less precise. As the crow flies is often not a very good indicator of potential customer base. National borders, rivers, transit design, competitor locations, etc can all mean that you might find yourself serving plenty of people 20km away in one direction but practically none 5km in the other.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#497

Post by roel_v » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:35 AM UTC

downandout wrote: post #479

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

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 sh…

You're arguing about how you think things should be, which is boring and trite, because opinions are like assholes - everybody's got one and most of them stink. What this is about, is how things are, and how they are is that redlining is illegal. So if you would take some time to look into the socioeconomic and legal history of this issue, you will find explained (ad nauseum) why certain choices were made in the past.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#498

Post by scarface74 » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:36 AM UTC

ars wrote: post #433

scarface74 wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s slightly different with roommates. You can’t discriminate in advertising when it comes to roommate but you can discriminate when it comes to housing according to one ruling. https://www.sharinghousing.com/what-the-fair-housing-act-mea... Craigslist says something different. https://www.craigslist.org/about/FHA#roommates Under federal Fair Housing law, the prohibition on discriminatory advertisements applies to a…

> will be sharing a bathroom, kitchen, or other common area, you may express a preference based upon sex only. I wonder if someone who has a particular dietary restriction (kosher, halal, gluten free, vegan, etc.) can express a preference for a like minded person.

As long as it’s not a protected class. For instance, I was once a hiring manager and everyone I was talking to was shocked when I said I would rather hire someone older and more stable. They thought I was opening them up to a lawsuit. Being under 40 is not a protected class. Being over 40 is.

I also told the recruiter that I wasn’t going to hire a guy because he smelled like cigarette smoke, I would be working closely with him and it bothered my asthma. Cigarette smoking is not protected in some states - including mine.

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#499

Post by roel_v » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:38 AM UTC

vkou wrote: post #435

int_19h wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the Pastafarians are just as much a protected class as Catholics, Jains and Druze. Only if they can demonstrate that their religious beliefs are sincere. There have been some court cases along these lines already.

Nobody asks a Christian to confirm that their beliefs are sincere, and that they aren't just pretending to believe in God, for the social benefits it brings.

Well just the last week, the Dutch highest administrative court ruled that Pastafarianism is not a real religion. Do you at least see why (you don't have to agree, just understand)?

Re: HUD Files Housing Discrimination Complaint Against Facebook

#500

Post by themarkn » Sun, Aug 19, 2018, 11:40 AM UTC

bumholio wrote: post #461

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

Redlining does not mean simply drawing red polygons on the map. To be guilty of redlining, Facebook must have known the ethnic/racial/religious composition of the excluded areas and it must have known that the advertisers were using the tools for discrimination. Quite a tall order.

I don't consider it a tall order, it's exactly what I'd expect advertisers to do with these tools, if there was no specific process to prevent them from doing so.