EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram • Hacker News Board

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#201

Post by teddyh » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:22 PM UTC

A_non_e-moose wrote: post #87

kwanbix wrote: post #6

I know in HN there is a big "personalized advertising" is bad sentiment, but I don't get what the problem is. I mean, if I am looking for a notebook, I rather have FB/IG (or Google or whatever), show me adds of a notebook that I might end up buying, instead of the generic poker/porn adds that we had on the beginning of the internet. It is almost impossible to have a free internet without ads. So on one side, people w…

> I mean, if I am looking for a notebook, I rather have FB/IG (or Google or whatever), show me adds of a notebook that I might end up buying, instead of the generic poker/porn adds that we had on the beginning of the internet. I would rather have rather than . That's not an equal comparison, neither does it represent a common scenario. > It is almost impossible to have a free internet without ads. So on one side, peo…

> […] ads to subsidize free internet usage, as it has been since the Internet's inception.

I can assure you, there was an Internet before ads, and it was better without them.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#202

Post by FirmwareBurner » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:23 PM UTC

konschubert wrote: post #185

josephg wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. And when I’m unhappy with my government, I can vote them out or, if I want to, get politically active. I can’t vote out Google. Their customers are advertisers, not me. And I don’t know which apps on my phone send my information to Facebook or what they do with it.

Then don't use google, duh.

Google ad-tech still tracks you as you browse non-google websites.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#203

Post by signal11 » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:24 PM UTC

dr_dshiv wrote: post #122

mjburgess wrote: post #90

Comments here so far focus on personalised ads as the issue -- but that's a symptom of what's being banned, which is the mass collection of personal data. Personalised ads are beside the point. The issue is how they are personalised, namely by building a rich profile of user behaviour based on non-consensual tracking. It isnt even clear that there's a meaningful sense of 'consent' to what modern ad companies (ie., go…

Why should it be illegal? I don’t understand the moral threat. Personally I feel that privacy gets too much airtime as a value — I see lots of other more direct issues (like political manipulation) that will remain an issue even with “strong privacy.”

The actual risk is data brokers, who aggregate this data and can use it for anything.

Using it to sell you shampoo isn’t terrible (it can be super annoying though). The problem is using that data to eg figure out who might be in the market for pregnancy related products. Or, ominously, who have stopped buying pregnancy related products early.

Or correlating interest in something they browse with voting intentions. Or interest in political action. There’s a lot of dodgy things you can do with that data. And little of this is being shared with *informed consent*.

Ads are NOT the problem. I love browsing through ads in magazines I buy. If online ads worked like outdoor ads or magazine ads, I suspect a lot less people would have a problem.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#204

Post by thfuran » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:25 PM UTC

Nextgrid wrote: post #133

mcv wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Political manipulation is a lot easier if the manipulator knows everything about you.

And doesn't even have to build & fund the infrastructure themselves. Same for government surveillance - adtech/marketing is a boon to it because they don't even have to build/maintain their own surveillance infrastructure anymore.

Not only that, but they can now just buy information that they wouldn't legally be able to collect themselves.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#205

Post by renegat0x0 » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:26 PM UTC

kwanbix wrote: post #6

I know in HN there is a big "personalized advertising" is bad sentiment, but I don't get what the problem is. I mean, if I am looking for a notebook, I rather have FB/IG (or Google or whatever), show me adds of a notebook that I might end up buying, instead of the generic poker/porn adds that we had on the beginning of the internet. It is almost impossible to have a free internet without ads. So on one side, people w…

Cambridge Analytica scandal showed that social media data can be collected and abused by governments.

Edward Snowden showed that global surveillance can lead to abusive system, in which there is no privacy, and everything is accessible by governments.

It is not about your personal advertising. It is not about your grocery lists. It is about creation of abusive system.

If social media have special portals for governments (at least I know about Facebook had one for New Zealand), then it opens a gateway for abuse.

- How do you know you were not abused?

- How do you know your data was not used by China to overthrow western civilization?

- How do you know that your data was not sold to Putin?

- How do you know that your data was not used by Left, or Right political party to change election results, like in Cambridge Analytica?

Companies do not have morality. They care about money, and laws (through fines). If a service does not require capture of data, then that data should not be captured.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#206

Post by kibwen » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:27 PM UTC

hartator wrote: post #183

fsflover wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But are personalized Facebook ads really an example of this? Yes: Facebook proven to negatively impact mental health (tau.ac.il) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32938622 Facebook collecting people's data even when accounts are deactivated (digiday.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29817297 Facebook test asks users if they're worried a friend is 'becoming an extremist' (cnn.com) https://news.ycombinator…

All of this are far from material harms. Compared to what governments can do and are doing.

Not only is Facebook a tool of oppressive governments, Facebook's own annual revenue is larger than the GDP of 2/3 of the countries in the world. I don't understand why people have this blind spot when it comes to giving corporations a pass on things that they'd criticize a government for. Most corporations are expressly authoritarian organizations, more so than many governments. Neither Facebook users nor Facebook employees can vote Zuckerberg out.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#207

Post by tsimionescu » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:30 PM UTC

pembrook wrote: post #176

tsimionescu wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trade is not a zero-sum game. Advertising is. The fact that advertising sometimes actually helps in discovering a product you actually needed is a coincidence. The main point of advertising is to convince people to prefer a product for reasons other than cost/benefit. Even in your case - did you see the ad and immediately bought the product? Or did you see the ad and then actually went and looked for reviews, competi…

> The main point of advertising is to convince people to prefer a product for reasons other than cost/benefit. This is false. If you've ever run ads before, the best way to get people to convert is to offer a higher cost/benefit than competitors. How do you think Uber grew from 0 to a 90B market cap? Magical emotional trickery? No. Uber advertised cheaper, faster, and more convenient rides. The definition of a better…

Uber still calls itself "ride sharing" and is advertising extremely misleading profit numbers and lifestyle promises to drivers. They also advertise better service than taxis, which is very much hit or miss (and vastly different between locations). Their advertising always shows nice clean cars, and that is also dubious.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#208

Post by thfuran » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:31 PM UTC

konschubert wrote: post #177

LightHugger wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you realize that large enough corporations are a form of government, your way of thinking really starts falling to bits... But, the government is the solution to when business gets too much power. You can't convince a profit motivated corporation to stop doing something evil as long as it's profitable, so it's the government's job to protect people from corporate governance.

[flagged]

>Google is very large but they don't run a police force

https://www.propublica.org/article/what-trump-and-biden-shou...

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#209

Post by realusername » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:32 PM UTC

kwanbix wrote: post #6

I know in HN there is a big "personalized advertising" is bad sentiment, but I don't get what the problem is. I mean, if I am looking for a notebook, I rather have FB/IG (or Google or whatever), show me adds of a notebook that I might end up buying, instead of the generic poker/porn adds that we had on the beginning of the internet. It is almost impossible to have a free internet without ads. So on one side, people w…

> It is almost impossible to have a free internet without ads. So on one side, people want everything free, on the other side, we don't want ads, so there is a clear problem here.

Ads are bringing so little revenue per user that I can't see how that can possibly be true. And even then people are paying the ads on the product they end up buying after.

Ads function at a macro economic level like a very inefficient tax scheme.

Re: EU data regulator bans personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram

#210

Post by ndriscoll » Thu, Nov 02, 2023, 1:32 PM UTC

pembrook wrote: post #112

squigz wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on how a government can 'ruin your life', while a company can't? This might be hard to grok, but we can actually be aware of both threats without minimizing the seriousness of either.

Governments have a monopoly on violence. And as history has proven (especially in the EU), they tend to use it. Even in good times, in countries with mostly balanced institutions, the government can lock you up in prison and throw away the key if you piss off the wrong people. On the other hand, I can assure you the only thing Unilever is aspiring to do is get you to buy more toilet bowl cleaner. And I know the rebut…

Others have addressed the surveillance issue plenty (but in case it's still not clear, if your data is for sale commercially, then your government will buy it), but I think it's important to also stress the insidiousness of repeated mass consumer propaganda, given your toilet bowl cleaner example.

Consider Oreo O's: a breakfast "food" with 11.5 g sugar and 1.3 g protein. Allegedly (according to the Wikipedia article), it was a very successful "food" and had approval from parents.

Now, if you ask someone whether it's appropriate to give your child a pile of sugar or cookies for breakfast, they'll probably tell you no, that's neglect. But somehow people have gotten it into their heads that products from Post or General Mills are acceptable, and weirdly enough now almost half of Americans are obese, and over 10% are diabetic, and how this could have come to be is a total mystery.

How did people come to the conclusion that something with marshmallows or cinnamon sugar swirls in every bite is appropriate to give your children every day? Or cans/bottles of sugar water? Something tells me the decades of endless advertising helped normalize it.

Look at the website for boxtops for education: big bold letters "YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOR SCHOOLS" (by giving your child sugar for breakfast). You're making a difference! You're a good person! This kind of propaganda is profoundly evil, and this is without targeting messaging to individuals.