Over the years Facebook has submitted thousands of patent applications for new and innovative ideas. Many of these aim to dig even deeper in our personal life in order to better know each one of us. What can be seen with all the following is that they serve in some sort to more efficiently target ads. We then see more invasive ads trying to manipulate us in buying stuff.
1. Long term predictions
Facebook is not only interested in our lives but also in what comes after, as one patent shows. By using information such as location, expenditure and interaction with others, they want to predict when you or your friends are most likely to die. Other significant life events like birth, graduation, moving or accident might also be determined. Our private lives are not private anymore.
2. Camera Tracking
Due to imperfections of your camera or scratches on the lens, Facebook wants to find unique fingerprints based on the alteration that these faults leave on the pictures you take. From the uploaded or shared pictures, it would be possible to trace back to which camera took what photograph. This is precious information about our social environment and trust we have in other persons.
3. Listening Smartphones
Facebook wants to record your environment to better know what activities you are currently doing, in what order you do them and with whom. Again, this is valuable insight in our private life to better target ads. A TV show could send a unique inaudible sound, which gets recorded by your device. Consequently, it would be possible to tell what you are watching, if you watch actively or simultaneously text your friends. Can you imagine what is being recorded the next time you “Netflix and chill” with your Tinder date?
Graph showing how different services influence people in taking actions and the path that is created
4. Emotion reading
By using your front camera, Facebook has thought of monitoring your reactions to the contents you see. Your face expression would reveal if you feel happy, bored, shocked or jealous. Depending on your reaction it will be easier to predict your reaction to different contents or ads.
These ideas are merely on the paper and Facebook claims that holding a patent doesn’t mean that they are using or will be using the technology in the future. The ideas alone are probably not of more value than what can already be done today. What makes Facebook really powerful is their potential monitoring of every single aspects of our day. Combining all the little bits of information collected here and there gives Facebook an unrivaled power. The question here is if we are ready to have all those information about our daily lives recorded and be used to feed us news and information. At SnowHaze, we believe that we should have more autonomy in deciding what we want to share. If you share our belief, you can download and use our free private browser to protect your data. Check it out at snowhaze.com/download.
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