Facebook May be Using Cell Phones to Listen to Private Conversations

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The post Facebook May be Using Cell Phones to Listen to Private Conversations appeared first on Healthy Holistic Living.

Facebook is known for bringing people together. It can help you to stay connected with friends and family, find your long-lost high school crush, or keep you entertained for hours with videos of baby animals. But, perhaps that’s not all they do. A husband and wife suspected that Facebook was listening in on their private conversations and placing ads on their newsfeed with the information, so they decided to conduct their own experiment on privacy and the internet to prove it.

Youtuber Shows that Facebook May be Listening to Private Conversations

Youtube user, Neville, and his wife suspected that Facebook was using the Facebook Messenger app on their cell phones to listen to their conversations with the internal microphone, even when the phone app was not in use. So, they put their theory to the test.

“My wife and I took a random subject we had NEVER ever talked about or searched online and talked about it while her iPhone was on in the background. Two days later, our Facebook advertising completely changed over to cat food for a few days[1],” Neville explains.

Neville and his wife state that they have no cats, and they have never conducted an internet search for anything cat-related, yet after a few conversations about cat food, while the cell phone was close by, advertisements for cat food suddenly appeared on their Facebook newsfeed.

Are They Really Listening?

The rumor about Facebook using your apps in order to listen to your personal conversations has been long running. It seems to have begun in 2014 when Facebook released a feature that allows it to use the microphone in your cell phone to identify music in the room in order to update your Facebook status[2].

This led people to start thinking, “if they can use the microphone to listen when we’re using the app, what’s to stop them from using it at other times?”

The suspicion arose when Ari Grant, a Facebook employee, released an explanation to the public about how the Facebook app is killing the battery life of cell phones.

“If you leave the Facebook app after watching a video, the audio session sometimes stays open as if the app was playing audio silently. The app isn’t actually doing anything while awake in the background, but it does use more battery simply by being awake[3].” Grant wrote.

Facebook’s Opinion on the Matter

In response to these incidents, Facebook released a 2016 statement saying that they do not use cell phone microphones for ads or news feed stories. They reiterate that they gather information for their ads based on people’s interests and other profile information, not conversations happening out loud.

They go into further detail about what they do use the microphone for so that viewers can be more aware of what they are granting access to when downloading and enabling apps:

“We only access your microphone if you have given our app permission and if you are actively using a specific feature that requires audio. This might include recording a video or using an optional feature we introduced two years ago to include music or other audio in your status updates[4].”

Rob Goldman, VP of ads at Facebook, has recently responded to the new wave of accusations via twitter:

I run ads product at Facebook. We don’t – and have never – used your microphone for ads. Just not true.

— Rob Goldman (@robjective) October 26, 2017

When downloading the Facebook app many people don’t realize exactly what it is that they are signing up for. In fact, in the Facebook Terms of Service Agreement, it states that:

“When you use an application, the application may ask for your permission to access your content and information as well as content and information that others have shared with you. We require applications to respect your privacy, and your agreement with that application will control how the application can use, store, and transfer that content and information[5].”

That means that you do have control over what Facebook has access to, but if you are unaware of how to adjust that then you may be unknowingly giving Facebook access to all of your information.

How to Keep Yourself Safe

Can you protect your privacy on the web? When using the internet and social media accounts it’s important to know exactly what you’re getting yourself into, especially when dealing with your privacy. Make sure that you read the Terms of Service before installing any new apps or programs on your cell phone and computer.

You can also ensure that your cell phone is protected by reserving your use of Facebook and other social media accounts to your computer. That way, you can delete the app on your cell phone and rest assured that your phone will only be used for the activities that you choose.

Social media has been a valuable tool for connecting people and keeping relationships current. But, with any great advancement there comes fear and doubt. Whether you believe that Facebook is actually listening to our private conversations or not, it’s important to protect yourself and your privacy by always being aware of what you’re signing up for. Stay informed so that you can enjoy social media instead of fearing it.

Sources

The post Facebook May be Using Cell Phones to Listen to Private Conversations appeared first on Healthy Holistic Living.

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