What is Social
Media Analytics?
Facebook Analytics: Should Users Be Allowed to Sue Facebook
for Cambridge Analytica Breach?
March 23, 2018
R. Sosby
Before I start, I want to make sure that I am clear on my
stance when it comes to the topic of Facebook.
Certainly, there are those who use Facebook
to connect with friends and occasionally visit the site to chat or catch up,
perhaps even view some family photos and keep in touch without having to wonder
about interrupting schedules, and in some cases, just let those who care know
you are still alive. I suppose there is little harm in using Facebook in this manner, though being old
school, I would rather use some 1980’s sentiment and “Reach out and touch
someone”, (for the younger crowd, that was the slogan for AT&T’s landline
service in the pre-cell phone age when we had rocks for pets and Pac Man
ruled!).
Let’s talk about the type of Facebook user. For an example, I will pick
on my sister because she is my sister, I love her, and it will give us one more
topic to argue about which is one of her favorite methods of communication. She
uses locator on Facebook so that there
is a record of her every move. When she arrives, she makes sure to let her Facebook
friends know that she is eating at whatever the given restaurant is or
shopping at whatever the given shop is. If she goes bowling, she constantly
updates her “friends” on the status of the game including who the players are
right down to the type of bowling shoes they are wearing in some cases. And
there is not a single moment that she does not capture and post on her Facebook. Her anthology could be written
in cell phone images plastered on this social media site. She writes about her everyday thoughts and is
constantly on her phone updating everyone with important headlines from the desk
of M. Sosby. The broadcast could easily achieve syndication.
Can you believe that she was upset this week when the
announcement came that there was a breach
of 50 million Facebook accounts by Cambridge Analytica? Could someone
who does not know my sister actually collect data on her without her knowledge?
Contact the Federal Marshalls, NCIS, The United Nations, Superman and Bugs Bunny! The nerve
of someone she does not know viewing the 24-7 broadcast. We must work quickly
to find these people and bring them before the Justice Squad. Simply
outrageous!
Here is how the conversation went after she was so dismayed,
and it left her speechless; for a moment. I asked her if she really thought
that she was the only person in control of her information online or if she had
ever heard the term public
domain. The response I received from her was trivial. Speaking as if she
were the only reason Facebook existed,
she exclaimed that the company had no right to give out her information. I
thought to myself, how naïve can she really be. Her information was not given
out and furthermore, if she hadn’t mapped out her life’s every movement for the
past n to the power of x years there would be nothing to collect!
According to the
terms of service outlined by Facebook, (updated 2015) “ you grant us a
non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to
use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP
License).”, which I interpret to say , you post it and we decide what to do
with it. Of course, there are rules that apply for the use of content and the
user has some control through the settings on their account.
Getting “friended” seems to be like a popularity game in
that the more friends you have, the more popular you are in theory. Some users
accept all friend request regardless of who is sending the request simply to
gather a larger number of friends. Could one of those friends be lurking on the
sidelines collecting information on your favorite foods, where you go to
church, family values, shopping habits, and any other number of things that
might be posted as content on the site? I believe there is definitely a flaw in
the system if the user is not careful to monitor persons they allow to access
their information through the friending system.
Now to get to the breach that is really not a breach but
perhaps it is a breach, but we will have to make that determination. According
to an article titled Revealed:
50 million Facebook profiles harvested for Cambridge Analytica in major data
breach the controversy started with the invention of a single app. A
professor at Cambridge University built the app during his off time, (away from
the university) to deliver a personality test via Facebook to users. The article goes on to
state that the New York Times reported “hundreds of thousands of users” took
the test and did so willingly, in addition they were paid for their
contribution to academic progress. The problem is that the app went on to
collect the information of all their friends which accumulated into the area of
around 50 million. Want to be my friend?
The information was then shared with Cambridge Analytica, a company that
according to their website “uses data to change audience behavior”,
(cambridgeanalytica.org, 2018). The whole deal had been hush-hush until a
whistle blower broke the news last week to the press. There are even
allegations that the information was used to help with Brexit and the last United
States Presidential election. Sounds like a breach could have happened; or
did it?
Mr. Facebook
himself, Mark Zuckerberg spoke
about the situation on Wednesday. According to Forbes, (2018) “Zuckerberg
confirmed that in 2013, a Cambridge University researcher named Aleksandr
Kogan created a personality quiz that was installed by about 300,000 people who
shared their data and some of their friends' data, giving Kogan access to the
data of tens of millions of Facebook users.” The article goes on to state that
the executive learned in 2015 of the relationship between Kogan and Cambridge
Analytica, including the collection of data that was out of the context with
the rules governing Facebook. Forbes, (2018) also states Zuckerberg “demanded that
he and Cambridge Analytica "formally certify" that they had deleted
the data, and both parties "provided these certifications…”, which
probably explains why in his eyes no data breach occurred; only a breach of
trust between a couple of entities.
To sum it all up,
having friends makes you popular. The goal is to be as popular as you can be,
so you want to have a lot of friends. Being friends comes with added benefits,
or in this case, headaches. Data was harvested from these users probably
against their wishes and without their knowledge. Should there be compensation
for the deceptive practice? Probably. Do the risks outweigh the rewards? We all
shall soon see!
Cambridgeanalytica.org, (2018) Data drives all we do.
Retrieved from https://cambridgeanalytica.org/
on March 24, 2018.
Forbes, (2018) Mark Zuckerberg Addresses 'Breach Of Trust'
In Facebook User Data Crisis. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/kathleenchaykowski/2018/03/21/mark-zuckerberg-addresses-breach-of-trust-in-facebook-user-data-crisis/#29b6dca63e36 on March 24, 2018.
The Guardian, (2018) Revealed: 50 Million Facebook Profiles
Harvested for Cambridge Analytica in Major Data Breach. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election on March 23, 2018.
Facebook.com, (2018) Terms of Service. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/terms.php on March 23, 2018.
