This Is What Big Tech Companies Such As Facebook Know About You
This Is What Big Tech Companies Such As Facebook Know About You. Data has become an asset to most of the big tech companies in that they can use this information to tailor the user’s experience with the platform. Things such as adverts and the type of products the user is interested in can be advertised to them specifically. This increases the effectiveness of advertising as people will be getting suggestions about things that they search on the web, as this increases the possibility of that person being interested in the product.
This practice by these tech giant can be seen as being unethical as they are using a person’s information without their consent. They are also monopolising their markets as they have access to information that they can use to help them gain advantage over their competitors. The web seems integrated because when one searches for a product on Google, that person will start to receive adverts that are similar to what they searched.
These companies practically take the information of the user and leverage it as an asset that they use to trade with. “Facebook is unusually aggressive, with Cortana listening in and Gmail seeing all of your emails, the ubiquitous nature of Google and Microsoft gives them access to an uncomfortably large amount of your information this data can be exploited by advertisers and others.” Security Baron wrote.
According to PC Mag, Facebook is particularly data-hungry as it gathers information about your work, income level, race, religion, political views, and the ads you click in addition to more commonly collected data points such as your phone number, email address, location, and the type of devices you use.
Twitter also collects the information of the user but it does so at a small scale as the micro blogging service doesn’t collect your name, gender, or birthday while Facebook, Google, and Microsoft all do, however, Twitter does know your phone number, email address, time zone, what videos you watch.
Security Baron categorises what data does six of the biggest tech companies such as Facebook, Google, and Twitter collect from you in The Data Big Companies Have On You inforgraphic and these are just the ones that these companies choose to disclose.
