Facebook’s Tentacles – Custom Audience Privacy Issue

Fergus Young2 Comments

Update 17/07/2018: I’d expect I will get a few people rolling their eyes in silence at me, particularly from the AdTech crowd, but I feel strongly enough about the issue that I have decided to start contacting each company appearing in the screenshot to ask them to remove my personal details from any “Custom Audience” Ad campaigns.

I am happy for companies I deal with to add me to their direct mailing list to advise me of any running specials periodically through E-mail, but I am not comfortable with that information subsequently being given to 3rd parties such as Facebook (being a particularly “privacy hostile” entity at that), The less personal information that goes to Facebook the better, I feel they have already become too powerful to our longer term collective detriment, by way of them feasting on our information, particularly given their ongoing business conduct.

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Original post: After having logged into my Facebook account for the first time in a fortnight,  Today I learn that businesses have been uploading their customer contact database to Facebook.  A trawl over the internet reveals that this has apparently been in place since 2013.

A question is whether or not organizations giving their contact list to Facebook constitutes, “Sharing your personal details with a 3rd party”?

Advertisers you’ve interacted with – Who have added their contact list to Facebook. (often unbeknown to the people on their contact list)

Facebook states, “These advertisers are running ads using a contact list they or their partner uploaded that includes info about you. This info was collected by the advertiser or their partner, typically after you shared your email address with them.”

Reading further, it appears more than just your email they can choose to upload. The information that could be included for matching includes things like your Phone number, Birthday, Gender, etc.

If companies are uploading their customer contact lists to Facebook as per Facebook’s Custom Audiences program, in my view, that pretty much lays at least the base, if they have actually chosen to do so, for Facebook to develop the alleged shadow profiles of Non-Facebook users and personally with me at least, this is NOT okay.

They say they drop all the info if there is no match, but after their ongoing antics, who can trust what Facebook Inc. actually says?

Facebook’s Tentacles – Custom Audience Privacy Issue

Vanuatu Tanna and Espiritu Santo

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Trip to Vanuatu over Easter from 29th March 2017 to 7th April 2018 – Including Espiritu Santo (click pictures to view gallery)…

Inside the Millennium Caves, Espirtu Santo, Vanuatu

…and the island of Tanna to see the Active Volcano of Tanna

Mount Yasur, an active volcano on the Island of Tanna, Republic of Vanuatu.

Sadly didn’t get my Helicopter trip to visit Ambrym this time around due to weather.

Apart from any up and coming work trips, I’m going dial back a little from traveling for a while, so the volume of trip photos will likely drop accordingly (Not that it really matters as such)

Vanuatu Tanna and Espiritu Santo

Internet 2.0, Proprietary, centralized, and locked-in

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Update 27/06/18 – Facebook reaches 200 USD per share, Too bad we collectively keep rewarding bad behaviour, Thanks for the cap gains though.

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Ironically, have discovered a lot of my time spent surfing the internet in the evenings is for researching about the Internet itself.

For all intents and purposes, It looks like older days of a largely decentralized Internet with inter-operable communication protocols (E-mail, XMPP, RSS) are pretty much going away, replaced by proprietary walled gardens operated by sole businesses for the primary purpose to maximize profits and designed to be sticky (addictive) and lock as many people in as possible so that it’s hard to escape.

Willful ignorance or otherwise, we collectively voted for this. People a decade ago remarked that I was “Oh So pessimistic” to suggest that Facebook would become as ubiquitous and as powerful as they are today. (By the way, Keep the glass, I don’t need it). Just a second while I write another put option on NASDAQ:FB (with the intention to add to my current holdings)

People keep getting outraged at Facebook’s behaviour, yet continues to reward and encourage it by continuing to use their services. While many have pledged to reduce their usage of Facebook (and other services), such actions seem to be nothing more than short lived and amounts to little more than “virtue signalling”, Furthermore, many of those people who say they are leaving Facebook are going on to suggest WhatsApp and Instagram (both owned by Facebook) as to where they will be moving to.  Hold on, let me increase my short put position.

Frankly, a decade ago, I did state that I would prefer to lose my access to the Internet completely rather than submit to Facebook should Facebook happen to take over the Internet to become the Internet. While in truth, it’s still a long way from that, the situation is that the Internet has now become so commercialized with much of it’s power now consolidated into the hands of a few corporate entities.

Anyway, I’ve decided to gradually reduce my use of the Internet in general and should the consolidation of power continue, will probably end up using the Internet rather comparatively sparingly — Keeping any use personally during my own time to Administrative stuff and the keeping in touch with closer Family and friends (using self hosted services where possible) while completely cutting to the bone any superfluous usage such as casual surfing of forums and especially surfing the Internet to research… well, about the Internet.

 

Internet 2.0, Proprietary, centralized, and locked-in

Pasifika and Corrections

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A little walk around Pasifika Festival today, Small album of pictures posted to NUI.NZ.

Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, Pasifika Festival 2018

With a surprise (to me) appearance of Jacinda Ardern along with Phil Goff (Mayor of Auckland).

Came earlier in the morning to avoid the crowds and the Afternoon Rain. Pacific Nations represented included, Hawaii, Fiji, Kiribati, Tonga, Samoa, Cook Islands, Tuvalu, Tokelau, Tahiti, Niue and of course Aotearoa. Full details on the ATEED website.

T’was handed info pack while walking past some stalls at Pasifika. A possible Career change from being a Computer nerd to a Corrections Officer? Not unheard of I suppose… It at least made me intrigued to look at what Corrections do.

Corrections Pamphlet handed out at Pasifika

In a lot of the “Just The Job” videos on Youtube… Lots of focus on rehabilitation, thought there was an acknowledgement that many offenders will “play the game”, get released only to return to prison again at a later date.

Currently Looking at the pay scale, If I ever was to take a front line position with Corrections, it would undoubtedly result in fairly sizeable drop in my pay.

Pasifika and Corrections

Motivations for setting up my own personal homepage

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As mentioned in my Facebook Notice, I had elected to build my own personal homepage for staying in touch with Friends and Family as opposed to relying on Facebook. In short, I prefer staying with decentralized inter-operable web protocols and standards (particularly those that allow me to self-host) where practical as it offers me more freedom and control over my own personal web presence.

While It is acknowledged utilizing proprietary platforms that are singularly owned and operated by sole for profit business entities have their near term benefits (many such platforms are Free of charge), they aren’t “neutral” mediums and are typically run with the natural focus of maximizing profits, ahead of the best of interest of their users or the wider world at large. (Engineering their products to be as sticky as possible, to keep people on their platforms for longer in order to serve advertising, locking them in so that it’s difficult to leave and consequentially, with an increased tendency to cause addiction in quite a few people).

Proprietary platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat are structured in contrast to say inter-operable protocols like regular E-mail where you have a choice of providers. A user on their choice of provider can E-mail another user on a different provider. No one provider controls the protocol.

It is worth highlighting that the more we use, rely, and pressure others to use these proprietary platforms (by way of the network effect), the more powerful these entities will naturally become. In the case of Facebook, it’s already large and still ever increasing influence and power in our lives (be it through through Facebook Original, Instagram, WhatsApp), I see as potentially detrimental thing to us in the longer term in the sense of…

“Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely”

Personally, I desperately struggle to see how so much power concentrated in the hands of any given single entity, especially a “for-profit” one, could ever be considered as a good thing for us in the longer run. While Facebook certainly isn’t alone in trying to get their mittens on everything we do online, there is a concern within me that should we allow the general trend to continue, (along side the gradual erosion of Civic Responsibility) we could see an erosion in our own individual self determination as we collectively cede ever increasingly control and power over our lives to such (non-democratic) business entities whom are ultimately answerable only to their owners and stockholders.

If you wish to visit the possibility of using alternatives mediums to stay in contact with friends and family, please see “Keeping in contact with loved ones” where I’ve listed out what I’ve done and the recommended stepping stones to reduce reliance on centralized, proprietary and commercially run services.

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Disclosure

As of February 2017 (About a year ago as of writing this), I am now a direct shareholder in NASDAQ:FB. The reality is I don’t think we Netizens are going to realize the longer term implications of where we are headed anytime soon. I do recall people seven years ago rebuked me as being “so pessimistic” for even suggesting that Facebook would become as powerful and ubiquitous as they are now. People are saying Facebook is dying and while that may now be true in North America for their original main name sake platform, many of those same people go on to suggest Instagram and WhatsApp (both Owned by Facebook), along with Snapchat (whom personally I consider as equally as obnoxious) as examples as to where everyone is now flocking to.

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Fergus Young
www.nui.nz

 

Motivations for setting up my own personal homepage

Matrix RIOT two Month Review.

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Have had an Instance of the Matrix “Synapse” Chat Server for two months now (instructions). The system operates alright, but in short, the User Interface for both the Android App and the Web Based user interface I found hasn’t been particularly fast… In fact, it feels a bit lethargic in a way akin to walking through a swamp.

Having said that, there is a new series of the server in development called “Dendrite” that promises to be faster with more optimal resource usage, but do not know when the developers are going to get around to formally releasing it to the public.

Will keep the current server up for now, but won’t be actively pushing or promoting it beyond family and a handful of friends. If people expressly mention that they are looking for an alternative, will mention it there and then along with my instance of Matrix/RIOT, but generally not before then.

 

Matrix RIOT two Month Review.

TradeMe – Not necessarily the cheapest place

Fergus Young2 Comments

First, here is something that I mildly found amusing…

Go on TradeMe, tell everyone how you really feel about Facebook…

As an aside, I don’t know about their business model anymore. I can’t say that buying from (or should it be through) them is necessarily the cheapest. While there are still bargains to be had, I have noticed that private individual sellers simply wishing to moved pre-loved goods on are getting fewer and fewer as years go by as they continue to get displaced on the listings pages by International Sellers or otherwise local drop-shippers, who often flood TradeMe with listings at asking prices higher than NZ RRP (Recommended Retail Pricing)… Continue reading “TradeMe – Not necessarily the cheapest place” →

TradeMe – Not necessarily the cheapest place

Branding Effects + Roadblocks to Web Decentralization

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(This post is a sort of a lead in from my previous post about Meetup.com)

Anecdotally, it seems the majority of groups which have left the Meetup.com platform have moved their group to Facebook. Branding I’ve come to realize is at play here with Facebook’s seemingly relentless march to take control as much of the web as humanely possible.

While I’ve found many people announce that they “Hate” Facebook saying it’s crap, to them, it’s a familiar sort of ‘Crap’, people subconsciously lean to Familiar because Familiar is “Safe”. Another words… “Better the Devil you know than the Devil you don’t”.

Like ‘McDonalds’ is to fast food, People may criticize their food as ‘plastic’, but yet keep coming back to it because there is some psychological guarantee that it will be the same ‘Plastic’ food they they know of. Take this, if you landed in a new country, would you try some unfamiliar food outlet selling unfamiliar food or head straight towards the Big illuminated ‘M’?  This is something that came to my mind when I was setting up a Test Instance of Oxwall and is something us Decentralization / Open web advocates are going to need to consider.

 

Branding Effects + Roadblocks to Web Decentralization

Gulf Eco Charters Hen and Chicken Islands

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Day boat tour on Gulf Eco Charters‘ Launch “Kokomo”, with Kurt Salmond and his Family. Click Picture below to access the Gallery on NUI.NZ…

Taranga Island on aboard “Kokomo”

Departed Sandspit Yacht Club, around past Tawharanui where conditions was quite wavy, then direct to Taranga Island, part of the Hen and Chickens archipelago for our first snorkelling stop.

Then westward to the west side of the island where we anchored for a nice light lunch prepared by Clair (Kurt’s other half) of wraps and muffins.

We then cruised around north past West Chicken island before heading east towards Lady Alice Island where we anchored at Karimoko Bay for another spot of Snorkeling.

Aftewards, a short stop by Sail Rock and then a smooth cruise back to Base at Sandspit. Continue reading “Gulf Eco Charters Hen and Chicken Islands” →

Gulf Eco Charters Hen and Chicken Islands

Riot Matrix: Background + Findings

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The following post deals with the background, along with my personal experiences and findings to-date with the RIOT/Matrix instant messaging and group chat system. To connect to the Matrix Synapse instance, please refer to the basic guide to get started.

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In Late December 2017, some concerns were raised among friends regarding their discomfort with Relying on WeChat (along with other proprietary commercial instant messaging apps) for communicating among ourselves, and subsequently I was asked whether or not it would be possible to add some sort of chat function to my website.

I’m going to be upfront. I don’t believe at this stage that I am ever going to pull the majority of my Facebook Addicted friend base out from the clutches of the Facebook eco-system (FB Messenger and WhatsApp) and at this present time, only aiming this service at Family and a handful of closer friends who have expressed desire to use an alternative instant messaging platform. Continue reading “Riot Matrix: Background + Findings” →

Riot Matrix: Background + Findings

Waiarapa Exploration Road Trips

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Over the New Year period, did a couple of road trips to explore around the Waiarapa region

First port of call was visiting Cape Palliser (Click Photo below to access gallery)

Cape Palliser Sunset

…and Putangirua Pinnacles (Click Photo below to access gallery) before diverting to Havelock North

Putangirua-Pinnacles

A later attempt to finish off the road trip was made shortly after my King Country Road Trip, where I went to visit the Gallipoli The Scale of our War Exhibition at Te Papa. Click picture below to access the Photo Gallery

Te Papa, Scale of War Exhibition

With a visit to Castle Point, Tinui ANZAC walkway and Stone Hedge Aotearoa (Click Photo below to access gallery) staying at Rusty Nail Lodge in Taihape on the way back.

Castle Point, Waiarapa

 

Waiarapa Exploration Road Trips

Victoria – A Fine State

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If you are planning to drive in the state of Victoria, during your trip to Australia, please note…

Self Drive Tourism Warning

While I never received a fine during my Road trip in Victoria, Australia, many other foreigners including tourists and those newly emigrated to Australia haven’t been so lucky (much to their horror at how comparatively strict and expensive the penalties were). If you’re used to driving at the speed limit, there is less wiggle room for even a momentary lapse in concentration should you be in the vicinity of an enforcement camera.

In Australia, the ethos of the “Speed limit not being a target, but the absolute maximum speed you are allowed to drive at” is perhaps instilled a bit more vigorously than say in New Zealand or North America for that matter.

  • The State of Victoria for example may set higher speed limits, but enforce them a lot more strictly (with a 3 km/h effective tolerance, by way of deducting 3km/h of the detected speed to form the alleged speed, along with heavy fines for even low level speeding).
  • In New Zealand, the speed limits may be set lower for the equivalent roading environment, but enforced more loosely (Higher general speed tolerance enforcement of 5km/h during holiday periods along with much lighter fines for low level speeding)

Victoria, Australia has some of the heaviest monetary penalties for speeding with fines that I’ve heard of, starting from 200 AUD for even just a few km/h over the speed limit along with 400 AUD fines for running red lights.

  • There are concealed (Not easy to spot) traffic enforcement cameras all over the state of Victoria. Melbourne in particular is swarming with Fixed Traffic Enforcement Cameras dotted all over the place, particularly on their Highways / Freeways, particularly under the over bridges cross over the motorways.
  • In Australia (and New Zealand), You can not make a free left (kerb side) turn on a red traffic signal as you can in many places in North America.
  • Road works zones are ENFORCED at the temporary speed limit, The State of Victoria’s fixed cameras can be adjusted to accommodate on the fly. There have been countless reports of even locals losing their licenses while traveling on the Freeways at 100km/h having missed the temporary 50km/h speed limit in place.
  • If you are driving a rental car at the time of the infringement, your Rental Car provider will most likely also slap an additional Administration Fee on top of any fines of around 66 AUD (if it’s a mailed speed camera fine). Unfortunately, it appears many Car rental companies do not make the hirer aware of how comparatively heavily and strictly enforced speeding is in the State of Victoria upon the hirer picking up the car from Melbourne Tullamarine international Airport.
  • The parking signs to those unfamiliar can be extremely confusing. Again heavy fines from around 80 AUD upwards applies for parking infringements.

While as a foreigner you may be able to get away with not paying any infringements, issues may arise at the border should you wish to enter Australia again.

The reason I’ve heard for such seemingly heavy enforcement for low level speeding is that it’s “aimed at bringing about cultural change in the driving public”. Another words, an attempt at “Nipping it in the bud”. That said, Victoria still has their fair share of speeders (The occasional hooner that is clearly 30 km/h above the speed limit) and the usual tailgaters following other vehicles closely as anywhere else in the world.

Continue reading “Victoria – A Fine State” →

Victoria – A Fine State

Week Beginning 1st January 2018

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Note: These are simply quick thoughts that have been jotted down. They have been categorized as “Insignificant” for very good reasons. They may contain hunches which will be unsubstantiated, unqualified and unquantified. Some of these points (each separated into their own paragraphs) may or may not be spawned into more substantial posts.

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Happy New Year

Fireworks in the Hood. The Sky City Fireworks though as a comparison against others years, wasn’t anything special… In fact, It may have been a little more subdued than prior years.

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Yes, Phone software updates can cause Utility loss.

As with my Xperia Z2 D6503. The 6.0.1 firmware update reduced performance, stability and subsequently utility + usability of WiFi. This was demonstrated to be the case when as an experiment flashed the Firmware back to Kitkat. There was demonstratably a Marked increase in stability and faster Access Pointing connecting over a range of regular access points I use during the week. Reflashed the firmware back to 6.0.1 and the issues returned. Sony never fixed this… Anyway, going to be replacing this device, has developed a few issues including a stuffed gyro (Think’s it’s upright when it’s 10° on the piss)

 

Week Beginning 1st January 2018