Cambridge Analytica Did Not Steal Your Data — Facebook Let Them Have it.
And so did you.
“What’s the worst that could happen?”, we wondered. So what if Facebook can have our personal data? If I’m getting better ads on my end, what’s so bad about it?
I come across ads for shoes, books, travel, and films on a daily basis. All these are a product of everything I’ve ever liked or commented on. I never gets ads for Crocs, for example (which I imagine I’ll start getting after this post).
It works for me. The price of a free web is publicity, and if that is more in tune to what I enjoy, then machine learn me, baby.
The problem is nobody knows how Facebook knows. You know?
Professor Zeynep Tufekci, in her TED Talk, provides and amazing and scary takedown of what it is we’ve created with social media. In short, she goes on to explain how nobody understand how the nameless, faceless “algorithm” that powers Facebook’s machine learning processes even works.
Facebook’s algorithm can dissect and tabulate millions of data points across millions of people throughout dozens of different cultures.
It comes up with stuff like “people who identify as werewolves are more likely to get up and mow the lawn if it‘s the first Sunday of the month’” (I’m paraphrasing).
Why? How? Nobody knows. The people who built it went “These are humans. Tell me everything you can about them” and it did.
Once again. Same question. How does any of this affect me?
It doesn’t. Not you, individually. The Algorithm is not after you per se. It’s after the quantifiable data of what you represent in a given section of “humanity”.
Maybe you’re the werewolf. The Algorithm would like to know when you get up to mow the lawn.
That’s Facebook’s whole business model. Figuring out who the werewolves are so they can sell their data to Artificial Moonlight Generators & Sons. We agreed to this, and I’ll be the first to admit I’m not going anywhere (#DeleteFacebookAndLogBackInImmediately).
Facebook provides a nice place to share our carefully curated pockets of excitement in our otherwise boring lives. In exchange we give it the ability to know if full moons affect us.
Sounds fair.
Couple of problems, though.
First, our data is being used against us.
Since the 2016 US election, it’s been evident that our “Likes” are being used to compile information on us. That information is then forwarded to propaganda machines on both sides of the aisle, which can rig entire elections.
By knowing you like — oh I don’t know — howling at the moon, the Algorithm can make the correct assumption that you’re afraid of silver bullets. It can also assume you dislike vampires moving into your neighbourhood. I mean, seriously, next thing you know you’re gonna have to take crucifixes down because they’re not vampire-friendly or something. What’s this world coming to?
The Algorithm has now learned one of your fears, and sold it to whoever’s buying. For the next few months you will be bombarded with articles about how vampires are ripping apart the fabric of your traditional furry society.
The more you “Like” those, the more it’ll serve up, the more the Algorithm is pushing you into your own echo chamber.
This happened during Brexit. This happened during the 2016 US Presidential election.
Second, Facebook can’t keep your data private
Over 50 million accounts were harvested by Cambridge Analytica. This is not a hack. These were not stolen. They developed a personality test, posted it to Facebook, and we let them have it all.
The sad truth is, this is all working as intended. The only thing Facebook is having a problem with right now is that Cambridge Analytica was not supposed to keep that data.
So Facebook told them to delete it. And Cambridge Analytica didn’t and said they did.
That was the end of it. Facebook decided it had bothered itself enough with it and went back to selling us cheap flights to Ecuador (No? Just me? Ok then).
But this is where the kerfuffle lies. See, the problem is that Facebook’s shareholders believe in Facebook’s value because of Facebook’s exclusive product: your data.
But if you have methods to harvest that data, without having to answer to Facebook itself, then Facebook is suddenly a much less interesting investment opportunity. The product is no longer exclusive.
Shareholders don’t care which flavour of propaganda is being pushed at any given time, as long as it’s still generating money. Yeah, spoiler warning.
So now Facebook has to patch the hole revealed by the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower. The hole that leaks data and waters down the value of their company.
Make no mistake, Facebook is feeling the pressure only because its stockholders are tightening the noose. It’s the Shkreli Effect.
Martin Shkreli, infamous pharma-bro and wannabe evil baron, raised the cost of a life saving drug from $13.50 to $750 and got off with a slap on the wrist. But when he defrauded investors, when he tried to pull a fast one on the 1%…? Well, he’s serving 7 years in jail now.
Facebook needs to change something soon, before its own board begins to feast on itself.
Will it limit the amount of data third party apps can acquire? If so, will that make third party publishers and developers less likely to use Facebook? Does less apps mean less engagement from people? Does that mean people will use it less? Providing less data?
Less data on people means Facebook’s surveillance machine is going to be less attractive to investors.
And this is without considering whatever comes out of Facebook hearings with governments of several countries.
So where’s the sweet spot?
It took Mark Zuckerberg 5 days to come up with a milquetoast statement about how they need to “do better”, but I’m not sure if that means they will do better at being the guardians of our data…
…or if they’re just gonna get better at hiding exactly how much they’re distorting people’s world-views.
There is no easy way out of this one. One could argue that since people are not going to #DeleteFacebook anyway, then we should wait until the outrage dies out.
It’s been 5 days. So by my calculations it still has another 12 hours before we’ve all forgotten about it.
It’s all well and good while Facebook is trying to sell you a new dress, or a new set of headphones because of course it knows you’re due to have already lost your current ones.
It’s part of the contract we signed into, and can’t get out of right now.
The problem comes when it starts identifying the werewolves.
And starts selling silver bullets to the vampires.
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