Facebook knows us well from its user data. The alleged illegal data mining of as many as 87 million users acquired by Cambridge Analytica means others might know us well too. Better than we want them to.
The NY Times reported that in 2014 contractors and employees of Cambridge Analytica, eager to sell psychological profiles of American voters to political campaigns, acquired the private Facebook data of tens of millions of users.
Some of the user data in question was accessed by authorizing the app “thisisyourdigitallife,” by Global Science Research, a personality app that told users the information was anonymous and for physiological research.
Around 270,000 people actually accessed the app. It gathered data on those users’ friends, until it had access to information from millions of users.
What type of information is gathered? What can people do with it? Here are 13 fascinating and frightening facts Facebook knows from our Likes.
- After you “Like” just 10 Facebook pages, advertisers (or political campaigns) can know you as well as a colleague, according to research from Cambridge University in the U.K.
- After 70 “Likes” as much can be deduced about you as a close friend knows
- After 150 “Likes,” you’ve given up as much about yourself to Facebook as your parents know
- 78% of people who “Like” brands on Facebook like fewer than 10 brands
- 76% of people have never “un-Liked” a brand
- 56% of fans say they’re more likely to recommend a brand to a friend after becoming a fan
- 58% of users “Like” a brand because they are a customer
- 51% of fans say they’re more likely to buy a product since becoming a fan
- More than five billion instances of people listening to songs online have been catalogued by Facebook withing 5 months
- 4 intermediary Facebook friends are usually enough to introduce anyone to a random stranger according to a study analyzing 69 billion friend connections among 721 million people
- 98 personal data points are used by Facebook to target ads. Targeting options available to advertisers today include: Location, Age, Generation, Gender, Language, Education level, Field of study, School, Ethnic affinity, Income and net worth, Home ownership and type, Home value, Property size, Square footage of home, Year home was built and Household composition
- 93% of Facebook friends have met in person the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project found
- Every 60 seconds, 136,000 photos are uploaded, 510,000 comments are posted, and 293,000 status updates are posted.
Do these facts about what Facebook knows surprise you? Does your brand need help navigating social media?
