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Instagram Head Asserts That Company Does Not Spy on Users

VOA News

   Instagram is not spying on its users conversations, according to the
   social media company's chief.

   In an interview on Tuesday with CBS, head of Instagram Adam Mosseri
   told CBS This Morning host Gayle King that Instagram was not listening
   to private conversations in order to tailor user advertisements.

   "We don't look at your messages, we don't listen in on your
   microphone," Mosseri said. "Doing so would be super problematic for a
   lot of different reasons."

   Mosseri acknowledged that his story was hard to believe.

   "I recognize you're not going to really believe me" Mosseri told King,
   who had repeatedly questioned the Instagram chief about how users would
   receive advertisements for products they had spoken about aloud but had
   never searched.

   Mosseri provided two potential explanations as to why users received
   ads for products and stores that they believed to have only disclosed
   in private.

   "There's two ways it could happen. One is dumb luck, which can happen."
   Mosseri said. "Repeatedly," King interjected.

   "The second is you might be talking about something because it's top of
   mind, because you've been interacting with that type of content more
   recently," he continued. "I think this kind of thing happens often in a
   way that's really subtle," he later said.

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