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Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

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Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#331

Post by bogomipz »

And yet in April Mark Zuckerberg told the US Congress that he wasn't "familiar" with shadow profiles[1]:

Lujan: Facebook has detailed profiles on people who have never signed up for Facebook, yes or no?

Zuckerberg: Congressman, in general we collect data on people who have not signed up for Facebook for security purposes to prevent the kind of scraping you were just referring to [reverse searches based on public info like phone numbers].

Lujan: So these are called shadow profiles, is that what they’ve been referred to by some?

Zuckerberg: Congressman, I’m not, I’m not familiar with that.

[1] https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/11/facebook-shadow-profiles-h...

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#332

Post by samstave »

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #255
wmeredith wrote: post #251

It’s a cycle. Facebook has been doing nasty shit and apologizing for it since 2003. I’m starting to think they aren’t actually sorry. https://www.wired.com/story/why-zuckerberg-15-year-apology-t...

Right, because Move fast and break stuff is their mantra. I'm surprised that articles doesn't even mention it. Perhaps Move fast and hurt people would be more honest. I think it's rather catchy.

Actually their motto is "Make money, because fuck you, that's why"

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#333

Post by 394549 »

barkingcat wrote: post #186
ardy42 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't this it though, the engineers designing the ad targeting system at Facebook is linking the random emails you use as "catch all" to your main identity so you can be targeted specifically even though neither party has full knowledge of the linkage between your catchall email and your main identity email. If you use the method described in the grandparent, you use a unique email address for every site (e.g site1…

This is no longer "just a little bit of effort and minimal cost" - most likely no one will use unique emails for every site as well as use private browsing mode permanently in order to avoid cross cookie / cross site contamination via 3rd party (non facebook) tracking. Which is cited as a "feature" - allowing clients to bring their own ad tracking database and integrating that into the FB one in order to make ad targ…

> This is no longer "just a little bit of effort and minimal cost" - most likely no one will use unique emails for every site

It takes a tiny amount of effort: you setup your domain with a wildcard so all you need to do to create a new email address is to use it. You could send mail to barkingcat@real.domain.for.394549.net right now, and it will be delivered to my inbox with no setup required.

It's also great in case you start spamming me. I don't have to struggle with your unsubscribe links, I can just blacklist all mail sent to barkingcat@real.domain.for.394549.net, and be done with it without any collateral damage.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#334

Post by tjoff »

will_brown wrote: post #219
tjoff wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of people do this, in the past it has exposed data leaks. My if my site-specific email giqjtodvdksu@... has been getting spam lately then it is likely that either they sold it or they got hacked.

>Lots of people do this... You mean a very small percentage of FB users do this? The point being as parent comment said it’s not “a little effort and minimal cost”. Figure a $10-15 overhead cost for the domain and maybe $5/month/e-mail account? Effectively to minimize tracking on Facebook one would have to spend a minimum of $70/year? It doesn’t seem like a great solution...go with a “free product” like Facebook in e…

No, it sucks, but it is the only way.

> May as well offer a competing service that doesn’t track you

I would kill for that. But this day and age it would be hard. Also, even subscription services typically see fit to track you and serve you ads.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#335

Post by samstave »

ummonk wrote: post #17

As a security engineer, I cannot overstate just how horrible this is. Phone numbers might not be an ideal 2nd factor for authentication, but to punish users for setting up 2FA by using the provided phone number for ad targetting is incredibly unethical.

Somewhere in the bowels of FB is the product manager who feels like a smug genius for coming up with this 'feature'.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#336

Post by zethraeus »

beaconstudios wrote: post #274
MaxBarraclough wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, because Move fast and break stuff is their mantra. I'm surprised that articles doesn't even mention it. Perhaps Move fast and hurt people would be more honest. I think it's rather catchy.

I think that's already taken by Uber's self-driving car division.

Not remotely funny.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#337

Post by justtopost »

ricokatayama wrote: post #268

cambridge, whatsapp founders, instagram founders, 2FA exploit and so on. What's next for Mark? And actually what would be the trigger for people to flee away?

Slow boiling the frog. Those who can notice at this point already left.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#338

Post by mtgx »

adpirz wrote: post #239

What's facebook's boiling point? My guess is they'll respond, they'll no longer use 2FA #'s for ads, the damage will have been done, and 99% of the population won't know any of it occurred. We'll repeat this cycle when a fresh revelation occurs months from now, as facebook continues to test how much they can leverage for more ad revenue. But none of it is actually slowing FB down. Its biggest dip in value came from d…

Facebook is already in decline (people have stopped using it, either completely or drastically reduced their usage of it).

The problem is Facebook is allowed to buy rising competitors on its way down, thus prolonging its monopoly in the social media space.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#339

Post by arkitectual »

dylan604 wrote: post #192
pixl97 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the app can look at your wireless, even that is not enough. It can just make a map of the SSID/BSSID around you.

Statements like this make me want to learn phone OS development just so I can have a better understanding on what information an app can get from the OS. Honest question, why would an app ever need to know the SSID of a wireless network? The app should only care if there is a valid network connection, and then use it. I can see being able to know if it is wifi vs cellular so they can have the option to limit large do…

An example would be an app for associating a device without a screen on to a wireless network. Think IoT devices or Alexa. Saves the user from having to type in the SSID which is a pain.

Re: Facebook Is Giving Advertisers Access To Your Shadow Contact Information

#340

Post by arcticbull »

MrEfficiency wrote: post #203
jeromegv wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That person is confusing different things. Apple is making it easier to use SMS 2FA in iOS 12 (automated copy paste) However Apple itself doesn’t use SMS for 2FA. As for Apple they had your phone number since the launch of the iPhone (!). Never needed 2FA to know it. And no, Apple isn’t selling your phone number.

>Apple isn’t selling your phone number. Until they have bad iphone sales. Given Apple's less than stellar track record toward developers, employees, and customers, Apple will do things for Apple.

No dude, Apple has an excellent track record for privacy of customer data. They don't share anything with anyone else, intentionally. It's a walled-in garden. They have always, and continue to, view themselves as a hardware company. They make money on hardware sales. I mean look at their margins. Any such activity, if called out, may lower their hardware sales.
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