“Yeah, me and my wife were talking about a new driveway, the next we knew we were both getting ads for driveway paving companies. The news says it’s just a coincidence…”
My wife and I were driving down the highway and I saw an old Cadillac, and I said, “hey, I like that old Cadillac.” Not even an hour later I got a facebook marketplace notification about a Cadillac for sale near me. I have NEVER searched for Cadillacs for sale.
I’ve had things like this happen, and I always suspected it was Facebook itself doing it, but now I think it’s also likely its something else feeding info into an ad system that then shows the ad on Facebook.
Every now and then I’ll just blurt out random things I want that I’d never want to see if I can trigger getting ads for it. Hasn’t happened in quite awhile now, probably because restrictions on doing it are getting better.
All of the discourse around “we can’t prove they are listening” feels like gaslighting, to me.
I don’t need proof. We have all have had this experience, and “it’s just tracking absolutely everything else so well that it guesses really accurately” isn’t in any way better, anyway.
It isn’t better, it’s even worse IMO. But it’s just the truth. It is verifiable enough that apps cannot just spy via your microphone in any reasonably modern OS, not even the old versions. What has never been verified though is that there are non-zero-day-exploit-ways to spy through your microphone.
Who didn’t know this?
“Yeah, me and my wife were talking about a new driveway, the next we knew we were both getting ads for driveway paving companies. The news says it’s just a coincidence…”
My wife and I were driving down the highway and I saw an old Cadillac, and I said, “hey, I like that old Cadillac.” Not even an hour later I got a facebook marketplace notification about a Cadillac for sale near me. I have NEVER searched for Cadillacs for sale.
Yeah, crazy thing is it’s never things I just think about but never tell anyone. Ads don’t come until I mention it out loud near my phone.
I’ve had things like this happen, and I always suspected it was Facebook itself doing it, but now I think it’s also likely its something else feeding info into an ad system that then shows the ad on Facebook.
Every now and then I’ll just blurt out random things I want that I’d never want to see if I can trigger getting ads for it. Hasn’t happened in quite awhile now, probably because restrictions on doing it are getting better.
However: https://m.independent.ie/business/technology/your-phone-isnt-listening-to-you-but-the-truth-is-scarier/42345949.html
Bullshit.
Useful response, well done.
All of the discourse around “we can’t prove they are listening” feels like gaslighting, to me.
I don’t need proof. We have all have had this experience, and “it’s just tracking absolutely everything else so well that it guesses really accurately” isn’t in any way better, anyway.
It isn’t better, it’s even worse IMO. But it’s just the truth. It is verifiable enough that apps cannot just spy via your microphone in any reasonably modern OS, not even the old versions. What has never been verified though is that there are non-zero-day-exploit-ways to spy through your microphone.