[HN Gopher] Facebook bans researchers who were investigating Fac...
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Facebook bans researchers who were investigating Facebook ads
Author : jimgordon
Score : 352 points
Date : 2021-08-04 17:17 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.dailydot.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.dailydot.com)
| tylermenezes wrote:
| I can't wait to see what excuse the Facebook apologists come up
| with in this thread.
| csilverman wrote:
| Usually all they have is the empty, evasive "well it's their
| platform and they can do what they want" tactic.
| noxer wrote:
| They could stop sending out (ad) data any time so no one
| could collect the data. Its their platform they can do
| whatever they want.
| aaron-santos wrote:
| Half the time this is a sarcastic way of saying that all
| legislative, and legal options are the on the table because
| popular opinion and market forces are unsuitable for forcing
| companies like Facebook to change.
| paulpauper wrote:
| I see all these NGOs , nonprofits, the media, and academics as
| filling in a sort of role that the govt is unable/unwilling to
| do, by trying to hold such companeis accountable. What the
| government does is quite limited despite how much it spends,and
| with the exception of egregious violations like blatant fraud or
| discrimination, tends to take a hands-off approach.
| amin wrote:
| "Facebook defended the action Wednesday, saying: "We repeatedly
| explained our privacy concerns to NYU, but their researchers
| ultimately chose not to address them and instead resumed scraping
| people's data and ads from our platform," a spokesman said."
| hjek wrote:
| The real issue is Facebook preventing research into vaccine
| disinformation:
|
| > "By suspending our accounts, Facebook has effectively ended all
| this work. Facebook has also effectively cut off access to more
| than two dozen other researchers and journalists who get access
| to Facebook data through our project, including our work
| measuring vaccine misinformation with the Virality Project and
| many other partners who rely on our data. The work our team does
| to make data about disinformation on Facebook transparent is
| vital to a healthy internet and a healthy democracy."
| TazeTSchnitzel wrote:
| > However, as Protocol noted in March, the information collected
| from accounts that did not "consent to the collection" that Clark
| appears to be referring to was actually advertisers' accounts,
| not private users.
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| The principle of we will track and follow you and all your
| friends and contacts, but you cannot peek into our matters.
| edoceo wrote:
| Who watches the watchers?
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| Congress supposedly, however it strikes me as if congress is
| blind on the matter, metaphorically speaking.
| Animats wrote:
| This already got the attention of a U.S Senator.[1] Another
| argument for regulating Facebook's ad business.
|
| [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-lawmaker-says-
| facebook...
| muaytimbo wrote:
| facebook sucks.
| 1helloworld1 wrote:
| Let's not forget that Aleksandr Kogan - the guy who harvested the
| Cambridge Analytica data was a research associate at Cambridge.
| Can facebook trust all the researchers at NYU? Can't one of them
| just leak and sell the scraped data? There are no guarantees that
| the scraped data will be used for just academic purposes.
| Facebook probably doesn't want another data-leak fiasco.
| daxuak wrote:
| Facebook has no business in dictating what plugins the users
| would like to have on their browsers. Sure they can ban
| scraping because reasons, but both this or the Cambridge
| Analytica case are not data-leak unless we are assuming that a
| user's personal data, contents they generated and their social
| relationship status are all Facebook's property.
|
| Acadamic use vs commercial use is a separate topic too imho.
| Sebb767 wrote:
| Well yes, but they can dictate whether you can use their
| service with these add-ons (or at all, for that matter).
|
| And irrespective of this opinion, CA backfired spectacularly
| _on them_ , so it's not totally unreasonable for them to
| enforce that right.
| daxuak wrote:
| I agree with you that they have the right to deny service,
| and scraping at scale is not same as regular queries.
| Suggesting FB's react was meant to protect (not theirs)
| data is what I feel not about right, though.
| bogomipz wrote:
| >"There are no guarantees that the scraped data will be used
| for just academic purposes"
|
| The whole point in the project is to make the scraped data
| available to anyone and everyone who is interested. They
| publish this data via a public database. This is articulated
| very clearly at the top of the Ad Observatory project page.
|
| "Ad Observer is a tool you add to your Web browser. It copies
| the ads you see on Facebook and YouTube, so anyone can see them
| in our public database."[1]
|
| The Ad Observatory project collects the following:
|
| "What we collect
|
| The advertiser's name and disclosure string.
|
| The ad's text, image, and link.
|
| The information Facebook provides about how the ad was
| targeted.
|
| When the ad was shown to you.
|
| Your browser language."
|
| Additionally the code for the browser plugin is up on
| github[2]. How much more transparent could they be?
|
| [1] https://adobserver.org/
|
| [2] https://github.com/CybersecurityForDemocracy/social-media-
| co...
| TechBro8615 wrote:
| I like how people change Alex to Aleksandr when they're trying
| to make a point about the big scary Russians, despite Alex
| being a fully American citizen.
|
| Of course it's much easier to blame muh Russia than it is to
| blame Facebook, who created the platform and by definition set
| its boundaries. They literally gave all the information to
| _Aleksandr_. All he did was read their documentation and query
| their API endpoints as designed and officially documented.
|
| He literally followed Facebook's instructions to get the data
| they offered to him. And yet here you are using weirdly ethnic
| overtones to denigrate him as some evil hacker that victimized
| Facebook by pilfering some nebulous "private" information that
| Facebook worked so hard to protect.
| turdnagel wrote:
| You're reaching a bit. His Wikipedia page lists his name as
| "Aleksandr Kogan". The OP didn't mention Russia at all, nor
| did he mention anything about him being evil. It's true that
| Facebook instructions to get the data - that was the whole
| point. The app users were installing never said that the data
| would be used in the way it ended up being used.
| TechBro8615 wrote:
| It might be a reach to ascribe malice to OP in this case.
| But the pattern persists, and the fact he's known more as
| Aleksandr than Alex is more the result of agenda pushing in
| the "reliable sources" than of a common policy to use full
| names. I'm sure you will find many instances of the same
| sources using nicknames for people they like.
|
| It's the same reason Fox News says "Alexandria Ocasio-
| Cortez" instead of the more common "AOC."
| wutbrodo wrote:
| His page on the Cambridge website, as well as his Twitter
| account, also use "Aleksandr". So far, there are multiple
| examples shared on this thread of him being referred to
| as Aleksandr and none of "Alex". Do you have _any_ source
| indicating that he prefers to go by the latter, let alone
| enough to conclude that there's a racist conspiracy
| afoot?
|
| > It's the same reason Fox News says "Alexandria Ocasio-
| Cortez" instead of the more common "AOC."
|
| Wouldn't you expect a news organization to use the full
| name for a politician instead of a colloquial term,
| regardless of how they feel about them? They don't say
| RBG either for Ruth Bader Ginsburg, despite the fact that
| Internet conversations use it heavily.
|
| I know this is a radical viewpoint these days, but it
| turns out that not literally everything is about race.
| thesausageking wrote:
| Users should decide who gets to use their data, not Facebook.
|
| And there's no guarantees with any data. Facebook itself can't
| be trusted to not have leaks. Two years ago, data from 500m
| profiles was leaked, Zuckerberg's own Facebook id, mobile phone
| number, and other information.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| There's a fallacy of composition and awareness here.
|
| Individual users:
|
| 1. May not be aware of how data are being used. (In fact this
| is a virtual certainty.)
|
| 2. Don't appreciate the immense power of data in aggregate.
| (Something that is close to Facebook's key commercial
| advantage.)
|
| 3. May be exposing data on _other_ users, who are not
| participating and /or don't _consent_ to particupate in such
| data hoovering.
|
| I'd argue that Facebook can also make exceptions, and that
| good-faith, well-reviewed research projects, particularly
| those aimed at independently assessing manipulation and
| propaganda efforts on the platform, _are_ a case I 'd
| strongly recommend. But to say that Facebook has _no_ right
| or obligation to decide is false on its face.
| spfzero wrote:
| Keep in mind that when evaluating a research proposal,
| Facebook will have zero interest in evaluating the "good
| faith"-ness, or "well-reviewed"-ness of the proposal. And
| to be fair they are probably not qualified to do that, and
| would have no incentive to become qualified.
|
| As a business, making a business decision, they'll want
| know "can this come back to bite us" (and they will miss
| many of the ways that might happen), and, how much will
| this benefit us either in money or in facilitating new ways
| of making money with the new information.
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| Cambridge Analytica got their data by obtaining consent from
| users to install their app on the FB platform, claiming that it
| was for academic use. The difference here is that this group is
| using a browser extension, but in both cases the methodology is
| to collect data from Facebook's API on behalf of the user.
|
| Facebook also goes after other browser extensions that scrape
| data, not just researchers:
| https://www.zdnet.com/article/facebook-sues-two-chrome-exten...
| trhway wrote:
| > their app on the FB platform ... this group is using a
| browser extension
|
| and that is the gist - is your browser a part of the FB
| platform or not (the situation of ATT network and the telephone
| and even just the phone book). FB behaves like it is and like
| as a result they have control over it. And them getting their
| way means we ultimately lose very important area of general
| computing. That has been already happening as unapproved ways
| of calling web APIs have been met with responses from C&D all
| the way to criminal prosecution.
| [deleted]
| penagwin wrote:
| Ha facebook can't handle people monitoring them and collecting
| data eh?
|
| Facebook just submitted this ad to me. I don't know why, they
| "trust" me. Dumb idiots.
| annadane wrote:
| The comparisons to Cambridge Analytica that I see here aren't
| correct. They got fined for being wilful about granting
| developers a lot of access to data, and I understand they're
| scared but this isn't being done in good faith, there is a
| difference in approach in how this should be done correctly vs
| incorrectly
|
| Thanks for the downvotes appreciate it
| Permit wrote:
| > there is a difference in approach in how this should be done
| correctly vs incorrectly
|
| I imagine you're getting downvotes because you need to expand
| on this.
|
| What specifically is NYU doing correctly that Cambridge
| Analytica was doing incorrectly?
| CountDrewku wrote:
| Everyone here told me Facebook is a private company, they can do
| what they want.
|
| So, what's the issue?
| joelbondurant wrote:
| Marketing is a con job.
| edem wrote:
| This somehow reminds me of what happened on Freenode a few weeks
| ago. They started to ban everybody who posed any amount of threat
| to the platform (real or illusory) which ended up killing the
| platform.
| lilactown wrote:
| The debate on who has control over data typically creates two
| parties: the individual user who it is related to, and the
| corporation providing the platform or product.
|
| We ought to add another party: the public. Perhaps data should be
| able to be used for the public good, and we should be able to
| participate in deciding what data is collected and how data is
| used.
|
| In this case, having data about what ads are seen, by whom, and
| why they see those ads, seems like it could lead to us better
| understanding how FB and other companies algorithms are
| segmenting the population and how certain ideas proliferate
| within those segments. This seems beneficial to the public, since
| as we've seen over the last 5 years or so, these platforms and
| the way they choose what information we see can have drastic
| effects on the economy, politics, etc. If I had a choice, I would
| choose to continue collecting data about the behavior of
| advertisers and the platforms that serve them for that kind of
| analysis. But we don't have a choice, because facebook "owns"
| that data.
|
| A number of people in this thread have referenced Cambridge
| Analytica. When Facebook does choose to share data with other
| parties, we have no say over what data is shared with them or
| what they may do with it. We don't even get a choice in how
| Facebook internally uses our data. Instead of democratizing the
| decision of what data is collected and how it is used, the FTC
| applied the rules of private property and fined FB for lack of
| privacy.
|
| The public got nothing out of that situation. Facebook now is
| more defensive of their ownership over our data, which also
| precludes us using it for the public good.
| djanogo wrote:
| They should create their own social platform and monitor that. /s
| cryptica wrote:
| The US government should just follow in China's footsteps and
| shut down Big Tech or nationalize them. Nobody with half a soul
| would complain.
| flerovium wrote:
| The researchers make the data public. This isn't like Cambridge
| Analytica.
|
| There shouldn't be a worry about what the researchers are going
| to do with the data because _they make it public._
| ParanoidShroom wrote:
| Mmmmh, i can imagine that scraping all that info could later used
| in a destructive way.
|
| >Facebook defended the action Wednesday, saying: "We repeatedly
| explained our privacy concerns to NYU, but their researchers
| ultimately chose not to address them and instead resumed scraping
| people's data and ads from our platform," a spokesman said.
| srswtf123 wrote:
| Yes, it sure could destroy the fortune that Zuckerberg built.
|
| "Dumb fucks", indeed.
| [deleted]
| paxys wrote:
| > To aid in their research, the group created a browser plug-in
| called Ad Observer, which collects data on the political ads
| users see and why they were targeted for the ad.
|
| Understandable that any entity that bypasses their API/consent
| flows and collects a user's data would be a big no, regardless of
| what their intended use is.
| TazeTSchnitzel wrote:
| > However, as Protocol noted in March, the information
| collected from accounts that did not "consent to the
| collection" that Clark appears to be referring to was actually
| advertisers' accounts, not private users.
| mcguire wrote:
| So Facebook's _users_ rather than their raw materials.
| judge2020 wrote:
| I don't think we should expect Facebook to go digging into
| every scraping extension to see if the scraping is done to
| obtain user data vs. advertiser data (stuff Facebook is also
| trying to protect, mind you). Especially with the amount of
| obfuscation and extensions they likely need to deal with.
| noxer wrote:
| Browser plug-ins I install on my browser are not FBs or any
| other companies business. I consent when I installed it and
| gave it the permissions.
| marketingtech wrote:
| You're also granting the extension access to your friends'
| data, given that it can see everything that you can. Your
| friends consented to show that data to you, but not to the
| extension developer. Your friends' consent is not transitive.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| Is this an argument about what an extension can do or what
| _this extension_ does? It appears not to read any data on
| your friends at all.
| noxer wrote:
| Still not FBs business. If I copy my friend private photos
| they would not care either. They are not representing my
| friend interest neither legally nor in any other way.
| [deleted]
| itg wrote:
| No, Fb is doing the correct thing in this case. If I
| upload data to Fb, I expect Fb not to allow others to
| scrape it. I gave pictures/info to Fb, not to you because
| you had a browser extension installed.
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| I'm not entirely sure I agree that Facebook is in the
| right here - analyzing the ads that are shown to you is
| different from downloading photos you uploaded.
|
| However, your principle argument that there's a
| difference between Facebook serving pictures to friends
| and massive, automated serving of pictures to bots and
| scrapers. I understand that there's no good way to
| differentiate, and that the bits that are sent over the
| network are the same regardless of who is consuming them,
| and that my friends have the technical capability to
| upload the images elsewhere.
|
| But just as you get different outcomes between one
| situation with an individual policeman watching traffic,
| pulling over reckless vehicles or tailing a suspect
| vehicle with a known license plate and another compared
| to a network of automated license-plate readers and speed
| cameras tracking the city-wide movement of lawful and
| criminal people alike, you get different outcomes when
| you differentiate between bots and live users.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| I've got some bad news for you:
| https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/internet/facial-recognition-
| s-d...
| alistairSH wrote:
| How is this any different than your friend saving the
| photo you posted and then showing it to her co-workers
| (or whoever else)? Are you are arguing that Facebook
| should disallow copying/downloading of any content on its
| network?
| daxuak wrote:
| I agree with the sentiment, but the line between read-
| and-record permission vs read-and-brun permission is
| really vague here. Scraping is exercising the right to
| read is the right to download in an automated manner on
| behalf of a user. Scraping bans (not limited to FB) are
| more of a commercial practice rather than caring about
| user consent/privacy imo.
|
| Personally I don't think access should be given based on
| assumption of the query's intention (daily browsing vs
| scraping data for analysis authorized by someone), but
| like r/w/x and user group, i.e. if you can view, then you
| can view and record. Otherwise either no access granted,
| or burn after read.
| lamontcg wrote:
| You realize that is completely unworkable, and anyone can
| take a picture of the screen of the photos that you
| upload and share them. Don't post anything on facebook
| that you don't want the whole world to know.
| noxer wrote:
| lol you can expect whatever form FB but they dont care.
| And if you gave access to the data to other people FB
| cant and wont do anything to prevent thous people from
| accessing the data and if access is possible scraping is
| too.
| [deleted]
| mdoms wrote:
| Read again what the extension does. You're so far off base.
| jasonlotito wrote:
| No. That's incorrect. The data they were gathering was
| advertiser data, not your friend's data.
| jxramos wrote:
| why they were targeted for the ad.
|
| How is that determined exactly? Does the clientside download
| details like that, for what purpose?
| daxuak wrote:
| According to the next paragraph, "Facebook provided about how
| the ad was targeted, and when the ad was shown to a user,
| among other things.".
|
| Haven't used FB in ages but I assume it's like "why am I
| seeing this" hint in youtube recommendations (which usually
| says "because you watched video x").
| j16sdiz wrote:
| There is a little link on each ad, when clicked on, would
| tell you why you are targeted
| mbesto wrote:
| > Understandable that any entity that bypasses their
| API/consent flows and collects a user's data would be a big no,
| regardless of what their intended use is.
|
| Generally I agree and understand FB's position. But isn't all
| of the data from Ad Observer publicly available?
| throwaway5752 wrote:
| Facebook is a platform capable of controlling large numbers of
| people through subtle manipulation with techniques and at scale
| not previously possible. There have been instances where it seems
| that capability is being tested (whether by Facebook itself or
| groups leveraging its platform). It's imperative people research
| this legally and ethically, which is what is was being done by
| the NYU group.
| wutbrodo wrote:
| > legally and ethically
|
| The ethical complaint is that they accessed data without
| consent:
|
| > "Facebook defended the action Wednesday, saying: "We
| repeatedly explained our privacy concerns to NYU, but their
| researchers ultimately chose not to address them and instead
| resumed scraping people's data and ads from our platform," a
| spokesman said."
| N00bN00b wrote:
| (I don't use the product. Or maybe I should say, I'm not a
| Facebook product)
|
| >Facebook moved to penalize the researchers in part to remain in
| compliance with a 2019 data privacy agreement with the Federal
| Trade Commission, in which the company was punished for failing
| to police how data was collected by outside developers, Clark
| said. Facebook was fined a record $5 billion as part of a
| settlement with regulators.
|
| That's a reasonable explanation for their action, right? Even if
| it's not 100% true, if you're a manager at Facebook, and the
| situation isn't 100% clear cut, you're still going to act, so you
| can show it as an example the next time the FTC tries to fine
| them.
|
| And they did offer an alternative:
|
| >Clark said Facebook offers targeting data sets for political
| ads, and has suggested the NYU group use that information.
| daxuak wrote:
| I'm not familiar with this research field but I would be
| concerned about what's the price tag came with that offer, and
| whether accepting that dataset is indeed in align with the
| research purpose, e.g. does it contain the relevant info, is it
| comprehensive, how could researchers prove that it's not
| manipulated / is the model used in production / is not biased
| towards FB's interest.
|
| I believe it is reasonable for FB to react to scraping under
| the current circumstances. But it seems equally reasonable for
| the researchers to go with the data collection approach they
| chose.
| whymauri wrote:
| The FB dataset drops an unmeasured/unreported number of ads
| that the researchers believe could be significant. It also
| lacks any demographic information, which is part of the study
| (participants consent via a browser extension).
| emodendroket wrote:
| Seems like regardless of what course of action you take someone
| could write an unfavorable article about it.
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