TikTok, collected information on children and sold it, sold US user data to the Chinese Government.
For all the people who go "Google, bad!", I'm still waiting for actual examples of what they've done that merits equivalence to the sites actually caught selling user data to brokers.
Google sells user data as well. It's their money printing business. Ever heard of DoubleClick? AdSense? AdWords? Etc. And Alphabet pet projects (Waymo, Sidewalk Labs, etc) were also designed to syphon more data to them. They have lots of 'em. They need projects like these because they've built a environment based on data consumption to feed their AI systems. Data is the new oil as they say. Now we're stuck with it. Pandora's jar has been broken for two decades or so now. And there isn't any way to fix it proper.
Facebook does not "sell" user data any more than Google does. Neither sell the data directly, they merely collect a ton of it (often without knowledge nor consent of the user) and allow advertisers to target ads against this data.
Facebook did not sell data to Cambridge Analytica. Facebook did not benefit from this arrangement at all and CA broke FB's terms of service, not to mention that ultimately it's down to users being stupid and explicitly delegating access to their account to CA - your data did not automatically end up on CA unless you or a friend of yours was stupid and disclosed it by delegating access.
I don't have access to their reporting systems, and even if I had wouldn't I be breaking the law?
What Google and Facebook along with their ilk do is exactly the same thing:
They collect data about their users. They sell their users' data to the highest bidder in the form of targeted advertising. Directly or not it's still selling users' data.
And don't get me started on what Snowden revealed about these companies as well. And the gall they had to claim they weren't aware they were being used to syphon data to the NSA. But that is, of course, a slightly unrelated matter.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 17.5 ms ] threadTikTok, collected information on children and sold it, sold US user data to the Chinese Government.
For all the people who go "Google, bad!", I'm still waiting for actual examples of what they've done that merits equivalence to the sites actually caught selling user data to brokers.
Show me what data they have sold and to who.
Evidence.
We have evidence that Facebook directly sold user data to Cambridge.
What Google sells is targeted advertising. Eg, "We can directly display your ad to those are most likely to appreciate it."
Google hasn't done the equivalent of "Here's our user data, do what you want."
Not one person has been able to provide any evidence that Google has taken user data and sold it to another.
Facebook did not sell data to Cambridge Analytica. Facebook did not benefit from this arrangement at all and CA broke FB's terms of service, not to mention that ultimately it's down to users being stupid and explicitly delegating access to their account to CA - your data did not automatically end up on CA unless you or a friend of yours was stupid and disclosed it by delegating access.
What Google and Facebook along with their ilk do is exactly the same thing:
They collect data about their users. They sell their users' data to the highest bidder in the form of targeted advertising. Directly or not it's still selling users' data.
And don't get me started on what Snowden revealed about these companies as well. And the gall they had to claim they weren't aware they were being used to syphon data to the NSA. But that is, of course, a slightly unrelated matter.