“The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads.”

https://www.wired.com/story/plaintext-time-to-talk-about-facebook-research/

This article above is a disturbing, quick take on Facebook research and the lack of transparency in what is being done, from a researcher who recently quit working there, and left this quote behind.

Chilling, the use of data by social media titans with a critical lack of oversight. The Cambridge Analytica – Facebook scandal, it seems, has not mitigated the giant’s appetite to turn their data about you, against you.

The other quote that disturbs me about this is: “If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product.” I’m not sure how to attribute this quote, and some dispute the accuracy of its pithy claims, but it does make you stop and think.

And if you are as disturbed as I am, maybe you’ll make some changes in the way you use Facebook. For example, I have:

• Removed the Facebook app from my phone. It is a power hog, and I am uncertain how much it tracks me and my activity. Instead, I the Safari browser to log in to Facebook when I want to and then quit the page when I’m done (unlike the app that can be on all the time in the background).
• Cut back my personal posts by 95% or more to Facebook. Instead, I write wordpress.com blogs and cross-post them to various platforms.
• Spend 95% less time browsing Facebook posts (and ads) by deciding to be more of a content creator than consumer (see above). I’m only browsing about once a week or so.
• I considered deleting my Facebook account entirely, and I may still take that step, however, the network effects of connecting with so many family and friends, is, as all of you know, very seductive and difficult to sever.
• Also, I now use DuckDuckGo as my default phone search engine, and as a plug-in to Google Chrome, so that it will purge my search history and so that Google, Facebook and others (when I use their website through DuckDuckGo’s filters and blockers) are prevented from placing and tracking cookies without my knowledge.

CMIO’s take? I’m certain I’m still leaking a data online, but I’m trying hard to throttle my bit-torrent down to a bit-drip. And I’ll keep looking for ways to take control back from the big guys (Facebook, Amazon, Google, Apple). What efforts are you making to protect your current and future privacy?

Author: CT Lin

CMIO, UCHealth (Colorado); Professor, University of Colorado School of Medicine View all posts by CT Lin