Facebook ‘erkänner’ att de använder ditt mobilnummer för att rikta annonser, även om du själv inte valt att dela den informationen.
Bakom avslöjandet är reportern Kashmir Hill från Gizmodo. Hon testade genom att själv skapa en kampanj för att visa en annons riktat till forskaren Alan Mislove, baserat på ett telefonnummer, som han inte delat på Facebook. Det tog bara några timmar innan Mislove kunde se annonsen.
Så här förklarar Gizmodo:
They [researchers at Northwestern] uploaded a list of hundreds of landline numbers from Northeastern University. These are numbers that people who work for Northeastern are unlikely to have added to their accounts, though it’s very likely that the numbers would be in the address books of people who know them and who might have uploaded them to Facebook in order to “find friends.” The researchers found that many of these numbers could be targeted with ads, and when they ran an ad campaign, the ad turned up in the Facebook news feed of Mislove, whose landline had been included in the file; I confirmed this with my own test targeting his landline number.
Facebook svarade med följande kommentar:
People own their address books. We understand that in some cases this may mean that another person may not be able to control the contact information someone else uploads about them. Of note, when people visit the “Uploading and Managing Your Contacts” screen we let them know that, “Facebook matches name and contact information you upload with name and contact information others have uploaded to provide a better service and make recommendations to you and others.”