Facebook collects a lot of data about you — everything from your email address to the strength of your phone’s battery, reports Recode, which added that the simplest explanation for this is that “Facebook uses that data to make money. No, Facebook doesn’t sell your data. But it does sell access to you, or more specifically, access to your News Feed, and uses that data to show you specific ads it thinks you’re likely to enjoy or click on.
“This targeted advertising is big business for Facebook. The company reported advertising revenue of $40 billion last year, and it’s only going to keep growing. Given the company’s recent privacy issues involving Cambridge Analytica, a third-party data firm that got its hands on personal data for as many as 87 million Facebook users without their permission, we thought it might be helpful to take a closer look at how Facebook uses your data to make money.
“It’s also clear that many people don’t know the details of how Facebook’s advertising business works. Many of these questions were asked by lawmakers … when Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before Congress in Washington, D.C.
“Some of these answers can be found in the company’s Data Policy, which Facebook just updated to better explain what it collects and how it’s used. We also asked a company spokesperson for responses to all of these questions.”
Those answers are summarized in the full Recode report, which you can find here.
0 Comments