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U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

reuters.com

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Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#111

Post by throwwebmaster »

wkavey wrote: post #42
throwwebmaster wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By accessing the data on a website, you are forming a contract with that website and are subject to the website’s terms and conditions. As a website owner, beyond that, there is no need to tell someone they cannot access your site if you simply block them from accessing your servers instead using a multitude of techniques. Where does caching come into play at all here? You cannot cache content to begin with if the se…

I'm pretty sure that first paragraph is false. Until I explicitly agree to a contract, or "terms and conditions", I am not bound by anything. If a site I navigate to embeds content from another website I am not immediately bound by the terms and conditions of that neclsred site, to think otherwise would invite madness. Not to mention the fact that terms and conditions are not contracts. I don't think they carry the s…

Less speculation and more facts:

https://www.upcounsel.com/are-website-terms-and-conditions-l...

This is heavily supported by Case Law.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#112

Post by throwwebmaster »

kcplate wrote: post #108
wkavey wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that first paragraph is false. Until I explicitly agree to a contract, or "terms and conditions", I am not bound by anything. If a site I navigate to embeds content from another website I am not immediately bound by the terms and conditions of that neclsred site, to think otherwise would invite madness. Not to mention the fact that terms and conditions are not contracts. I don't think they carry the s…

Plaintiff: “Judge, when the defendant used my public website, a contract with me was implicitly made” Judge: “what defendant? There is no one here.” Plaintiff: “Oh he was anonymous, so I am not sure who it was…” Judge: “Hmm interesting, so you seem to think an implicit contract exists that you want to enforce with no documentation at all with a party you can’t name, because you are not sure who it is?” Plaintiff: “Ex…

This clear instance of reductio ad absurdum is wholly non-analogous. Factually inaccurate court proceeding depictions and legal misunderstandings aside, for one thing, the non-hypothetical defendant’s identity is well-known in this specific instance.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#113

Post by throwwebmaster »

nieve wrote: post #37
throwwebmaster wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By accessing the data on a website, you are forming a contract with that website and are subject to the website’s terms and conditions. As a website owner, beyond that, there is no need to tell someone they cannot access your site if you simply block them from accessing your servers instead using a multitude of techniques. Where does caching come into play at all here? You cannot cache content to begin with if the se…

Not according to some rulings the last few years. A contract requires a meeting of minds.

No.

According to many rulings the last few years, continually and systematically accessing a third party’s data under the clear expectation that you are aware of (as well as agreed to) their terms is definitely a meeting of minds.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#114

Post by throwwebmaster »

bilbo0s wrote: post #15
apazzolini wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Up until June 14th of this year, the ruling was that scraping is legal from the HiQ vs LinkedIn lawsuit[0]. While finding that link for you, I learned that since that date, the Supreme Court vacated the decision back to the lower courts in light of a new decision of theirs.[1] Now I don't think it's clear one way or the other just yet. Any lawyers here with an opinion on how this is going to go? I haven't found any a…

Well given all this and the consent decree, I'm kind of seeing why FB made this decision. If it's legal, let the FTC say so explicitly. It's probably very bad strategy to allow the privacy leak, and then hope that the FTC agrees with your decision later. No one will be sanctioned for adhering too strictly to consent decrees, but you could be sanctioned for being too loose. So the choice is obvious in that light.

It will be interesting to see how the FTC will rectify its ongoing fight to hold FB more accountable for protecting its users’ private data with the FTC’s ostensibly contradictory position to allow mass scraping of private user data at scale in this case. Cambridge Analytica was doing roughly the exact same thing, which was precisely what motivated the FTC's involvement in the first place.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#115

Post by throwwebmaster »

kcplate wrote: post #107
throwwebmaster wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By accessing the data on a website, you are forming a contract with that website and are subject to the website’s terms and conditions. As a website owner, beyond that, there is no need to tell someone they cannot access your site if you simply block them from accessing your servers instead using a multitude of techniques. Where does caching come into play at all here? You cannot cache content to begin with if the se…

I think you missed the word “public” on my comment. If you are posting content for public consumption, unless that content is copyrighted by you AND I republish/sell/etc it. You basically don’t have much to say if I choose to keep a copy of it. If you don’t want me to have a copy of it for any reason, don’t let me have it at all.

Is it public though? For one thing, you need to have a registered user account and be part of the targeting audience as a winning biddee for ad placement in order to see the ads in question. As an ordinary person, unless you share your private login credentials with me (which would be another ToS violation), I cannot view nor access the ads you have been shown.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#116

Post by throwwebmaster »

dathinab wrote: post #82
Sebb767 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't throw you in jail over it, but it's within their rights to stop sending you these bytes or kick you off their platform altogether. If they'd try to prevent you from scraping third-party sites it would be making laws; setting up ground rules with their ToS and enforcing them is absolutely fine.

> but it's within their rights to stop sending you these bytes or kick you off their platform altogether. Actually no. If a platform provides a generally available service they are (in many countries, idk. about the US) not allowed to arbitrary exclude some people they don't like without a legal valid reason. And braking legally not valid/binding terms in a ToS is not a legal valid reason. Just because you write some…

The FTC is a US government entity.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#117

Post by throwwebmaster »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #87
Sebb767 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't throw you in jail over it, but it's within their rights to stop sending you these bytes or kick you off their platform altogether. If they'd try to prevent you from scraping third-party sites it would be making laws; setting up ground rules with their ToS and enforcing them is absolutely fine.

Imagine I am scraping Twitter - maybe I never accepted their TOS and don't even have an account.

Interesting that you mentioned Twitter. Twitter requires a user account to access content. Try accessing Twitter while logged out.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#118

Post by throwwebmaster »

literallyaduck wrote: post #100
throwwebmaster wrote: post #5

Don’t most websites prohibit someone from scraping and harvesting the data on them? Most recently, I can think of Yelp, Amazon, and GitHub prohibiting this, as well as the Aaron Swartz case.

Are these "researchers" going to be charged the same as the martyr Swartz?

The parties here would be the US FTC and FB, so no.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#119

Post by kcplate »

throwwebmaster wrote: post #112
kcplate wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plaintiff: “Judge, when the defendant used my public website, a contract with me was implicitly made” Judge: “what defendant? There is no one here.” Plaintiff: “Oh he was anonymous, so I am not sure who it was…” Judge: “Hmm interesting, so you seem to think an implicit contract exists that you want to enforce with no documentation at all with a party you can’t name, because you are not sure who it is?” Plaintiff: “Ex…

This clear instance of reductio ad absurdum is wholly non-analogous. Factually inaccurate court proceeding depictions and legal misunderstandings aside, for one thing, the non-hypothetical defendant’s identity is well-known in this specific instance.

Interesting. I would have thought that someone with the ability to craft such a sesquipedalian response would also have been capable of understanding irony.

Also…you missed the word “public”, again.

Re: U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research

#120

Post by throwwebmaster »

kcplate wrote: post #119
throwwebmaster wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This clear instance of reductio ad absurdum is wholly non-analogous. Factually inaccurate court proceeding depictions and legal misunderstandings aside, for one thing, the non-hypothetical defendant’s identity is well-known in this specific instance.

Interesting. I would have thought that someone with the ability to craft such a sesquipedalian response would also have been capable of understanding irony. Also…you missed the word “public”, again.

While I appreciate your nod to my writing (I have a mutual appreciation, I might add, for your Soliloquising), again, none of the data obtained was public.
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