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A comment on Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation. Parent comment

Re:Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation by downandout on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @05:44PM (#16642701)
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/facebook-data-...

"Facebook was surprised we were able to suck out the whole social graph, but they didn't stop us once they realized that was what we were doing." - Carol Davidsen, Former Obama Campaign Director

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Re:Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation by JumpCrisscross on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @05:52PM (#16642772)
> Facebook was surprised we were able to suck out the whole social graph, but they didn't stop us once they realized that was what we were doing

The extraction of Facebook's social graph is the element I agree "finds comparison in the 2008 or 2012 races" [1]. But Obama's campaign didn't mis-represent its identity nor intentions to Facebook. Kogan and Cambridge Analytica did. Obama's campaign didn't lie about deleting its data when asked to (which, to my understanding, it wasn't). Kogan and Cambridge Analytica did. Moreover, Obama's campaign reported its backers to the FEC; Kogan and Cambridge Analytica do not.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16642536

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Re:Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation by downandout on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @06:00PM (#16642837)
CA didn't represent anything to Facebook. They never created an app. They bought data, years later, from Kogan, who had created an app. Kogan violated Facebook policies, but there again, he didn't "misrepresent his identity [or] intentions" to Facebook. You didn't (and still don't) have to represent any intentions to Facebook to create an app. You simply create the app and agree to the platform terms and conditions. You're framing this as if CA & Kogan created some kind of special relationship with Facebook under the guise of academic research, and that just isn't the case. The only app in this situation that was granted special permissions or where Facebook knew the true intentions was the Obama app, and it's arguably worse that Facebook knew what their intentions were. That's because they knew that about half of the users involved - 95 million people out of 190 million - would never have knowingly allowed their data to be used to help Obama, but they allowed it special access anyway.

As for Obama's campaign not being asked to delete data, all apps were required to delete data that they came into possession of under the pre-2014 policy. Those were the terms they agreed to when they deployed the app - especially one that was allowed special access to the entire US social graph (where no other app would have been). So if Kogan violated the policy, so has the Obama campaign.

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Re:Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation by Gaelan on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @07:40PM (#16643551)
The "false intentions" here are about the user agreeing to use the app.

Obama: "Give us a list of your Facebook friends, and we'll help you contact them about voting for Obama." While the Obama campaign did collect data about friends, this data was voluntarily given to them by users. If the Obama campaign had your Facebook data, it was because one of your friends knowingly and voluntarily gave it to the Obama campaign.

Kogan/CA: "Take a free personality quiz!" The people taking the quiz likely had no idea that they were supporting a political campaign or helping Trump win. You could have your data given to CA even if nobody in your friend graph supported it.

Also, that 190 million figure is probably inaccurate, because there is probably significant overlap in people's friends lists.

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Re:Zuckerberg on Cambridge Analytica situation by downandout on Wednesday March 21, 2018 @08:00PM (#16643755)
this data was voluntarily given to them by users

It was given to them by the 1 million users that authorized the app. Not the other 189 million (or more) users.

Also, that 190 million figure is probably inaccurate, because there is probably significant overlap in people's friends lists.

According to their own campaign manager, they "sucked out the whole of the social graph" with Facebook's blessings. So they may have actually had more than 190 million, since there are more US users that on Facebook.

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