Cambridge Analytica & Social Data

The Ethics of Facebook Data Mining for Advertising Purposes

Cambridge Analytica was a data analytics and political consulting firm that came to public attention in 2018 for harvesting tens of millions of Facebook user profiles and using them to build models of personality and voting behaviour. A whistle‑blower revealed that CA had worked with an app developed by academic Aleksandr Kogan (via his company, Global Science Research), which collected data not only from test‑takers but also from their Facebook friends.

According to the reporting, some 50 million profiles (and in other estimates up to 87 million) were part of the dataset.

Because Facebook is a platform that holds vast amounts of personal data—“likes,” shares, networks of friends, behavioural patterns—the breach raised urgent questions about how social‑media platforms may enable micro‑targeted political advertising. The Guardian’s coverage emphasized that CA “spent nearly US$1 m on data collection, which yielded more than 50 million individual profiles that could be matched to electoral rolls.” The Guardian 

Side Note: A common point of confusion has been the name “Cambridge Analytica” and whether it has any connection to the University of Cambridge. The University explicitly stated that despite its name, Cambridge Analytica has no connection or association with the University. University of Cambridge 

The data allowed CA to build algorithms to determine personality traits and deliver tailored political messages—a new frontier in advertising where targeting is at the individual level (or very small segments) rather than broad groups. This connection between Facebook data, data analytics firms, and digital political advertising triggered major regulatory, legal and reputational consequences for Facebook and others.

The advertising implications are significant. If a firm can determine psychological attributes from Facebook activity, it can target ads (in the political context: campaign material) to people whose profiles indicate they are persuadable, or craft messages that resonate with particular personality types.

In the CA‑Facebook case, the question was whether the data had been harvested without proper authorization, whether Facebook’s platform allowed the spreading of such data to a firm engaged in political campaigns, and whether the resulting advertising was transparent, traceable or within existing regulations for political campaigning.

The story thus shines a light on the intersection of social‑media platforms, behavioural data, and political advertising.

Facebook Advertising, Social Media & Data Mining

If you use social media apps or online search engines, chances are you give up a lot of your privacy every day, willingly and happily! With current technology, we waive some, but not all, privacy rights to use online services embedded in our society, and the benefits typically outweigh the costs.

The emergence of new media, storing data and data mining has perhaps led to an evaporating concept of online privacy. Every time we interact with the online world, we leave behind a trace, a digital record of our activity. Large media conglomerates then use computer and network surveillance to mine our data, our digital activity and footprint when we use their services, so they can sell us to the highest bidder. Some say that this is not the "internet" we signed up for, yet billions participate in life online. One social media conglomerate controls the primary channel people rely on most to engage on the internet: Facebook. They provide services so integral that it is difficult to imagine the internet without them.

Facebook is the world's dominant social media company and a thriving platform for businesses to boost brand awareness. They own services that mine users' data (their online behaviours, attitudes, and interests) to sell it to paying advertisers. These are terms everyone agrees to: the cost of using the service. The reason for mining users' data is for advertising purposes. With the data they gather on every user's online habits, interests, and lifestyle, Facebook can then sell advertising space on the user's main page.

Some call this a punch to our right to privacy; however, this service is free and not forced upon anyone. An organization needs to generate capital to survive, and if it offers a free service to the public, it needs to find other ways to support itself. In comparison, it is a similar system to the radio.

Radio is a free service for users, and it sells advertising time to earn money. Facebook simply uses a more structured system to mine users' data to create an advertising platform that benefits both the business and potential consumers.

With Facebook's structured advertising system, businesses can reach consumers who are likely to use/need their products or services. For smaller and local community businesses, it makes a difference! For businesses, using Facebook as an advertising platform takes out the hassle of conducting research like which services to use, when and where.

The algorithm created by Facebook provides businesses everywhere the opportunity to advertise to a targeted audience for far less money than traditional services like newspapers, radio or bus benches. Additionally, a structured advertising system like Facebook's is more effective for businesses to reach an audience genuinely interested in their products.

The consumer also reaps benefits from structured social media advertising. Facebook users are only shown ads that an algorithm has specifically curated for them based on their online behaviours and interests. With this process, consumers are no longer targets for every ad, but only for those an algorithm believes may interest them.

If, for any reason, the advertisement is offensive to the user, they can request to never see this business's advertisements again. In a traditional advertising setting, you have no choice or control over what or how you are advertised to; with social media advertising, consumers have some control.

Final Thoughts on Cambridge Analytica & Ethics

Using social media services does infringe on our online privacy; however, the benefits outweigh the costs. If we want to keep these services free for public consumption, there needs to be a give and take between the user and the provider. Social media advertising gives small businesses a fair price to market directly to an audience who demonstrates a need or want for their goods and services.

On the other side, users are no longer a target for every business advertisement, simply ones that may be beneficial to them based on their online interests and behavious. Facebook's structured algorithm pairs consumers and businesses together for a mutual benefit.

Cinch Communications never sells client data and uses only white-hat, transparent marketing techniques. If you have questions, get in touch!

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