Twitter to pay $150 million for selling users data for Ads - page 2.

Johnyz

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Quote from: Upgrade00 on May 28, 2022, 11:20:56 AM

Quote from: justdimin on May 28, 2022, 07:39:28 AM

This shows that these data could be used to literally rule the world.

Precisely.
During the era of door to door sales; salesmen have to knock on the doors of tens or hundreds of people, majority of who are not interested in the product being put on sale. Fast forward to today, companies can simply collect datat of what user searched for what product, or who said what in a conversation, market that data to retail services with location of the potential customers and this is just a pinch of what data could be used to do.

Confidential data should be more safe on a company like this but then again, they failed to do so and that’s why they are being fined by that huge amount of money. With the technology that we have right now, I think many of us are already exposed so better to use every security feature to assure that your personal account are more safe. Twitter is not the only company who are doing this, many are still have under the table transactions.

crzy

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Quote from: eaLiTy on May 28, 2022, 03:56:07 PM

Quote from: Lucius on May 27, 2022, 06:57:45 AM

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I'm really interested in what the new T boss will do in this regard, especially when we know how much he paid for his new toy.

I hope Elon Musk will not entertain selling user information and i believe he purchased the toy to make changes to their business behavior especially how they are censoring users for their opinion. I am not a big time social media user even though i used when it started and i stopped because everything you get for free you need to sacrifice your privacy and data.

The purchase is still not final as far as I know, Elon is playing with Twitter and tries to manipulate its value, most probably he will do the same thing. Many companies sells the data of the users and I wonder when the government will caught other social media companies, protecting the details of every user is a must, its just that there’s a big money for selling it and that’s why many are doing this.

uneng

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Promises and words uttered by social medias' managers mean nothing, because they are constantly changing their policies and terms of service. It's common to login into twitter or facebook accounts and have yourself freezed into a new agreement page where you have to say you accept the new terms imposed to you, as a platform's user. From months to months a new agreement is imposed by those platforms and I don't doubt between those little repetitive words there is something like "I agree you sell my personal data to whoever you want", although they are never going to defend a position like that publicly, so they need to play the good guys now saying they are very commited with the privacy of their users and wouldn't sell their data anymore.

That is ridiculous and revolting. The minimum twitter should do were to say to who they have sold data, for how much and provide a mechanism for every users to check if they had informations sold. Moreover, give the money they were paid to the people who had data leaked.

eaLiTy

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Quote from: Lucius on May 27, 2022, 06:57:45 AM

~
I'm really interested in what the new T boss will do in this regard, especially when we know how much he paid for his new toy.

I hope Elon Musk will not entertain selling user information and i believe he purchased the toy to make changes to their business behavior especially how they are censoring users for their opinion. I am not a big time social media user even though i used when it started and i stopped because everything you get for free you need to sacrifice your privacy and data.

Lanatsa

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Quote from: Upgrade00 on May 28, 2022, 11:20:56 AM

Quote from: justdimin on May 28, 2022, 07:39:28 AM

This shows that these data could be used to literally rule the world.

Precisely.
During the era of door to door sales; salesmen have to knock on the doors of tens or hundreds of people, majority of who are not interested in the product being put on sale. Fast forward to today, companies can simply collect datat of what user searched for what product, or who said what in a conversation, market that data to retail services with location of the potential customers and this is just a pinch of what data could be used to do.

On the era on what we do have today where accessibility could really be done in almost instant then its no surprise that we would really be putting on a situation where data could really be used
into different aspects which it could really be putting them into advantage specially on having sales or connected to it.

Thats why any platform specially centralized ones couldn't really be trusted 100% when it comes to our information which it could be potentially be leaked or be used into other aspects
on which we are currently seeing on what Twitter is been doing.

For the sake of money then everyone or everything could really make a sudden turn without having doubts.

Kavelj22

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Quote from: ?? on ??

is it possible for twitter to sell user data to third parties to achieve its career. I'm a little confused by this case where Twitter gets a lot of trust from users but still dares to violate user privacy by selling user data at will. Is there no party responsible for this incident so that users get comfort for the security of their data.

After all those hopes that the platform will achieve progress in spreading freedom of expression with the acquisition of a single mask and his promises to develop it.
It is truly a resounding surprise that such serious charges are being brought against him.

This is supposed to destroy its reputation, especially since it is not known the true amount of data that was used and whether this will not be repeated again in the future.

Upgrade00

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Quote from: justdimin on May 28, 2022, 07:39:28 AM

This shows that these data could be used to literally rule the world.

Precisely.
During the era of door to door sales; salesmen have to knock on the doors of tens or hundreds of people, majority of who are not interested in the product being put on sale. Fast forward to today, companies can simply collect datat of what user searched for what product, or who said what in a conversation, market that data to retail services with location of the potential customers and this is just a pinch of what data could be used to do.

TheNineClub

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Quote from: Cookdata on May 27, 2022, 04:21:29 AM

Quote from: https://www.npr.org/2022/05/25/1101275323/twitter-privacy-settlement-doj-ftc

In court documents made public on Wednesday, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice say Twitter violated a 2011 agreement with regulators in which the company vowed to not use information gathered for security purposes, like users' phone numbers and email addresses, to help advertisers target people with ads.

Federal investigators say Twitter broke that promise.

"As the complaint notes, Twitter obtained data from users on the pretext of harnessing it for security purposes but then ended up also using the data to target users with ads," said FTC Chair Lina Khan.

Twitter broke their promise about how they collected their user data (email and phone number), they violated the agreement^[1] that was presented in the paperwork with the authorities back in 2011, and they have been charged and fined $150 million for selling it for Ads.
Similar organizations have exploited data in business, and many of them have always denied it to the public, but after further digging and investigation, the lies become burst into the public.

The fine itself seems like a slapp on the wrist and nothing more than that. For a number like that, twitter and other companies can afford to sell the data and pay the fines if the get caught. I mean, they made 5B dollars last year, so a couple of houndred mill here or there is just written of as bussiness expendeture at this point.

iv4n

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Quote from: Yogee on May 27, 2022, 06:53:18 PM

Quote from: mindrust on May 27, 2022, 04:39:09 AM

.... In this particular case, Twitter probably has made a lot more profits than the penalty amount ($150m) by selling their user data. So they can get away with it even after paying the fine and I am pretty sure they will come up with a creative way to avoid this penalty anyway.

It's what I was thinking too. This amount is just a slap in the wrist for these big platforms.

Where do these fines go by the way?

I read the article, I tried to search around, but I couldn't see anything about the profit they made! It's my first thought as well, if they need to pay a $150 million fine how much did they earn in the first place!? I guess we are talking about billions here...

Quote from: dothebeats on May 28, 2022, 05:29:49 AM

These huge companies lie to their teeth even though they have legally sworn they will not do what they shouldn't do. Big companies will always find loopholes, legally or not, to have things their way and to make more profit off of their consumers without them knowing of what these huge companies are doing.

It's why I don't like KYC! It's why I don't leave my phone number everywhere... it's why we need privacy! I guess they would sell our asses just to make a profit, only if they could!

justdimin

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Quote from: Upgrade00 on May 27, 2022, 09:56:06 AM

Once personal data is shared, it should be considered to no longer be personal, regardless of what the other party claims they wish to use it for.
Data is one of the biggest markets and social platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Google and the rest have loads of it by collecting presumably harmless data to fulfil whatever sign up conditions they set. It has become so much of a norm now, users barely care what is collected and how it is used, or rather they fail to see any danger in their phone number, or web history being tracked and stored.

This is a trend that is not going to stop anytime soon, best to take precautions to protect yourself if you do not want your details shared.

Unfortunately, there are companies making billions off this situation and they are fine with it. Remember that before 2016 elections of trump, and even brexit, there were companies buying and selling data and using it to make sure that they got their candidate elected.

If they could convince their own view people to go out to vote in bunches, they did that via ads, if they could convince opponents people to stay home, they did that. They did everything they could, not just to convince people to vote for a candidate, but precise ads for each person in order to get the most optimum result for their candidate. This shows that these data could be used to literally rule the world.

dothebeats

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These huge companies lie to their teeth even though they have legally sworn they will not do what they shouldn't do. Big companies will always find loopholes, legally or not, to have things their way and to make more profit off of their consumers without them knowing of what these huge companies are doing. IMO, $150m is not enough of a fine for selling users data. It should be more. Remember Google's $5b fine in EU? Not entirely similar case but the nature through which they took advantage of their users is very similar.

Strongkored

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Quote from: Captain Corporate on May 27, 2022, 02:55:53 PM

The question is, did they made more money from this or not? If they made more money from this, that means that they are going to repeat and they do not mind, because in the end it was still profitable and Twitter is a company, they do not care about your user data or whatever, they care about making a profit just like every other company. However, if there is a good law that will keep them in check, like first time is 150 million but the second time is 15 billion or even worse, then maybe they will reconsider it next time. Or if they lost money on this from the get go, then they will definitely not want to do it at all.

Of course they make money because why risk their company's reputation if they can't get more money in this illegal way. Twitter has changed ownership but we know the new owners are people who are also money oriented and all entrepreneurs are like that and will they continue to look for ways to profit by using their user data.

Wexnident

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Yeaa I don't think fines should be the only punishment for selling user data. Or if it was, then at least make it an amount where it could visibly damage the company so that they'd think twice before doing it again (or for other companies, doing it). Even if we do say that this is the usual practice that these big companies do, it doesn't make it an excuse for the law to let them do as such, especially if it wasn't an actual first instance for these big companies to do it.

Quote from: Lanatsa on May 27, 2022, 04:50:51 PM

Comes to a point where it's not really that surprising anymore if we do talk about probabilities on having those user data would leaked or something that's been sold and is there something that we can do? Nothing!

Don't use them. Or at least, don't give out any info you think could potentially lead to you. Use a throwaway email address, and a mobile number as well if possible.

Yogee

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Quote from: mindrust on May 27, 2022, 04:39:09 AM

.... In this particular case, Twitter probably has made a lot more profits than the penalty amount ($150m) by selling their user data. So they can get away with it even after paying the fine and I am pretty sure they will come up with a creative way to avoid this penalty anyway.

It's what I was thinking too. This amount is just a slap in the wrist for these big platforms.

Where do these fines go by the way?

Quote from: CryptoPanda on May 27, 2022, 06:39:13 PM

The companies they sold user data to should be fined as well. This will discourage others from the act but I'm afraid it has become a tool that's become necessary in today's market. Private companies pay good money for user data, it helps them know what to sell you and how to sell you. It's all geared towards advertising and selling their products. Google is the biggest offender of this crime, they spy on their users all the time.

First thing you have to look at is that are they prohibited from getting these kinds of information? Are they also prohibited from using it and selling their prpducts? Personal information are protected but I don't think it's treated the same way as buying illegal drugs.

CryptoPanda

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The companies they sold user data to should be fined as well. This will discourage others from the act but I'm afraid it has become a tool that's become necessary in today's market. Private companies pay good money for user data, it helps them know what to sell you and how to sell you. It's all geared towards advertising and selling their products. Google is the biggest offender of this crime, they spy on their users all the time.

n0ne

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This is already known, being centralized these corporate networks will go on selling user data when they feel greedy. Often we see these kind of issues, data collection and selling is a big profit of modern day economy. Every firm says that they don't sell our data to anyone. Based on different analytics, data is the key on each and every business. It is found that every user data on an average with health care records costs $250. In this situation surely these fellows fall for big money.

crzy

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There’s still a lot of companies that sells are identity, this is why we are receiving emails/phone messages regarding something and its good that they finally have a proof with this one, so for sure people will be more aware about sharing their personal information and be careful next time. I wonder if banks also do the same thing? Maybe someone should initiate the investigation with them.

Lanatsa

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Quote from: NeuroticFish on May 27, 2022, 04:35:14 AM

I've said it before: don't believe what the big companies say, just because they pinky swear it.

Greed is big. The investors want results, i.e. trucks of money.
Policies change over time and they may tell you or they may "forget" to tell you about that.

Users' data is a hugely valuable asset. And, believe it or not, the related legislation is so thin, we can say we're still in the times of wild west.

Comes to a point where it's not really that surprising anymore if we do talk about probabilities on having those user data would leaked or something that's been sold and is there something that we can do? Nothing!

Just like you've said that companies could easily make U-turn and would break out those promises that they do have in the past that's why it's better to prepare nor get used yourself into these stuffs considering for it to be that typical.

Gyfts

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People upset at Twitter should also look towards facebook and particularly google for manipulating user search results along the political leanings of executives that run the company, who on top will take user data and sell it to the highest bidder. When something is free, you are the product. If politicians weren't spineless they would regulate these large tech corporations, but they realize political campaigns become easier with big tech censoring the opposition.

Fortify

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Quote from: Cookdata on May 27, 2022, 04:21:29 AM

Quote from: https://www.npr.org/2022/05/25/1101275323/twitter-privacy-settlement-doj-ftc

In court documents made public on Wednesday, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice say Twitter violated a 2011 agreement with regulators in which the company vowed to not use information gathered for security purposes, like users' phone numbers and email addresses, to help advertisers target people with ads.

Federal investigators say Twitter broke that promise.

"As the complaint notes, Twitter obtained data from users on the pretext of harnessing it for security purposes but then ended up also using the data to target users with ads," said FTC Chair Lina Khan.

Twitter broke their promise about how they collected their user data (email and phone number), they violated the agreement^[1] that was presented in the paperwork with the authorities back in 2011, and they have been charged and fined $150 million for selling it for Ads.
Similar organizations have exploited data in business, and many of them have always denied it to the public, but after further digging and investigation, the lies become burst into the public.

Broke their promise? They broke the law and got caught. Frankly it shows that the regulators are always far behind the criminal activity taking places and it's probably by sheer luck that they got wind of this. Facebook went through similar things and you know what they most likely learned? How to hide the malicious activity they are doing even better, and besides that - the punishment is likely to cost them tiny amounts compared to the money they can potentially earn from abusing data in these ways. $150 million sounds like a big number to us, but it's pittance to this multibillion dollar company and comes under the "cost of business" category in some accounting line. The regulators need to be more proactive instead of reactive if they want applause.

Topic: Twitter to pay $150 million for selling users data for Ads - page 2. (Read 332 times)